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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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What is an earthquake?
Earthquakes are the shaking, rolling or sudden shock of the earth's surface. They are the Earth's natural means of releasing stress. More than a million earthquakes rattle the world each year. The West Coast is most at risk of having an earthquake, but earthquakes can happen in the Midwest and along the East Coast. Earthquakes can be felt over large areas although they usually last less than one minute. Earthquakes cannot be predicted - although scientists are working on it!

Click Here to learn more about earthquakes from USGS.

What causes an earthquake?
There are about 20 plates along the surface of the earth that move continuously and slowly past each other. When the plates squeeze or stretch, huge rocks form at their edges and the rocks shift with great force, causing an earthquake. Think of it this way: Imagine holding a pencil horizontally. If you were to apply a force to both ends of the pencil by pushing down on them, you would see the pencil bend. After enough force was applied, the pencil would break in the middle, releasing the stress you have put on it. The Earth's crust acts in the same way. As the plates move they put forces on themselves and each other. When the force is large enough, the crust is forced to break. When the break occurs, the stress is released as energy which moves through the Earth in the form of waves, which we feel and call an earthquake. (Graphic Credit: Wheeling Jesuit University/NASA Classroom of the Future)

Click Here to see an animation of an earthquake. It's great for kids, because they get to see how it actually happens!

What is a fault?
A fault is an area of stress in the earth where broken rocks slide past each other, causing a crack in the Earth's surface. There are the major types of faults: dip-slip normal, dip-slip reverse, strike-slip, and oblique-slip.

What are plate tectonics?
The theory of plate tectonics is a interesting story of continents drifting from place to place breaking apart, colliding, and grinding against each other. The plate tectonic theory is supported by a wide range of evidence that considers the earth's crust and upper mantle to be composed of several large, thin, relatively rigid plates that move relative to one another. (See plate tectonic graphic above.) The plates are all moving in different directions and at different speeds. Sometimes the plates crash together, pull apart or sideswipe each other. When this happens, it commonly results in earthquakes.

Continental Drift: To see this animation again, just refresh this page! This animation shows you what our planet looked like millions of years ago and what it looks like now! (Graphic Credit: Geology Department at University of California, Berkeley)

What is a seismograph?
A seismograph is an instrument used for recording the intensity and duration of an earthquake.

Click Here to calculate the strength of earthquakes!

What is a tsunami? A tsunami is a large ocean wave usually caused by an underwater earthquake or a volcanic explosion. Tsunamis are NOT tidal waves. Tidal waves are caused by the forces of the moon, sun, and planets upon the tides, as well as the wind as it moves over the water. With typical waves, water flows in circles, but with a tsunami, water flows straight. This is why tsunamis cause so much damage!

Know the Lingo

EPICENTER - The point on the earth's surface directly above the source of the earthquake.

SEISMIC WAVES - The energy created by the quake travels in waves from the epicenter, where they are the strongest. The waves shake buildings, structures and the earth vertically, causing them to move horizontally!

RICHTER SCALE - A measurement of an earthquake's intensity. Each one-point increase on the scale indicates ten times the amount of shaking and 33 times the amount of energy. The energy released by a large earthquake may be equal to 10,000 times the energy of the first atomic bomb.

4

Minor Earthquake

5

Moderate Earthquake

6

Strong Earthquake

7

Major Earthquake

8

Great Earthquake

Richter Scale

Earthquake Safety Tips
BEFORE AN EARTHQUAKE: Have a disaster plan. Emergency preparedness can save lives. Choose a safe place in every room. It's best to get under a sturdy piece of furniture like a table or a desk where nothing can fall on you. Practice DROP, COVER AND HOLD ON! Drop under something sturdy, hold on, and protect your eyes by pressing your face against your arm. If you live in an earthquake prone area, bolt tall furniture to the wall and install strong latches to cupboards. Prepare a first aid kit for your home. By taking special precautions and checking for hazards before a disaster strikes, you will be much more likely to stay safe. DURING AN EARTHQUAKE: DROP, COVER AND HOLD ON! Stay indoors until the shaking stops. Stay away from windows. If you're in bed, hold on and stay there, protecting your head with a pillow. If you're outdoors, find a clear spot away from buildings, trees and power lines. Then, drop to the ground. If you're in a car, slow down and drive to a safe place. Stay in the car until the shaking stops.

AFTER THE SHAKING STOPS: Check for injuries. Inspect your home for damage. Eliminate fire hazards, so turn off the gas if you think its leaking. Expect aftershocks. Each time you feel one, DROP, COVER AND HOLD ON.
Earthquake Activities
Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on learning about how thrust faults are responsible for the uplift of many mountain ranges across the world, including the Los Angeles Basin. This is a great lesson plan for middle and high school students.

Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan keeping track of earthquakes around the world. In this activity, kids keep a record of the location of earthquakes for a week and learn about plate tectonics.

Earthquake Experiment: Here is a great experiment that explains how to prepare for an earthquake.Science Fair Ideas: Here is a list of science fair project ideas that deal with earthquakes.

Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Rain & Floods

How does rain form?
Water droplets form from warm air. As the warm air rises in the sky it cools. Water vapor (invisible water in the air) always exists in our air. Warm air holds quite a bit of water. For example, in the summer it is usually very humid. When enough of these droplets collect together, we see them as clouds. If the clouds are big enough and have enough water droplets, the droplets bang together and form even bigger drops. When the drops get heavy, they fall because of gravity, and you see and feel rain.

What causes rain?

When clouds develop or rain occurs, something is making the air rise. Several things can make this happen. Mountains, low-pressure areas, cold fronts, and even the jet stream.

How big are raindrops?
Raindrops are much smaller than we think! They are actually smaller than a centimeter. Raindrops range from 1/100 inch (.0254 centimeter) to 1/4 inch (.635 centimeter) in diameter.

How fast do raindrops fall?
Not including wind-driven rain, raindrops fall between 7 and 18 miles per hour (3 and 8 meters per second) in still air. The range in speed depends on the the size of the raindrop. Air friction breaks up raindrops when they exceed 18 miles per hour.

What is a flood?
A flood results from days of heavy rain and/or melting snows, when rivers rise and go over their banks.

What is a flash flood?
A flash flood is sudden flooding that occurs when floodwaters rise rapidly with no warning within several hours of an intense rain. They often occur after intense rainfall from slow moving thunderstorms. In narrow canyons and valleys, floodwaters flow faster than on flatter ground and can be quite destructive.

Do flash floods hurt people?
Flash floods are the #1 weather-related killer in the U.S. Nearly 80% of flash flood deaths are auto related. Know beforehand if your area is a flood risk.

How much water is needed for your car to float away?
A mere 2 feet of water can float a large vehicle or even a bus. This is why you should never drive through flooded roads. Just 6 inches of rapidly moving flood water can knock a person down.

What is a monsoon?
A monsoon is a seasonal wind, found especially in Asia that reverses direction between summer and winter and often brings heavy rains. In the summer, a high pressure area lies over the Indian Ocean while a low exists over the Asian continent. The air masses move from the high pressure over the ocean to the low over the continent, bringing moisture-laden air to south Asia. During winter, the process is reversed and a low sits over the Indian Ocean while a high lies over the Tibetan plateau so air flows down the Himalaya and south to the ocean. The migration of trade winds and westerlies also contributes to the monsoons. Smaller monsoons take place in equatorial Africa, northern Australia, and, to a lesser extent, in the southwestern United States.

What is radar?
Radar is an electronic instrument, which determines the direction and distance of objects that reflect radio energy back to the radar site. It stands for Radio Detection and Ranging. This is what meteorologists use to see rain or snow.

What is Doppler Radar? Doppler Radar detects precipitation intensity, wind direction and speed, and provides estimates of hail size and rainfall amounts. Doppler Radar gives forecasters the capability of providing early detection of severe thunderstorms that may bring strong damaging winds, large hail, heavy rain, and possibly tornadoes. Combined with satellites, radar gives forecasters the ultimate tools to provide accurate forecasts and advanced severe weather warnings.

Doppler Radar gets its name from the Doppler Effect. Have you ever listened to a train whistle as it was coming toward you? You probably noticed that the pitch of the whistle changed as the train passed you and moved away. This change in the frequency of sound is called the Doppler Effect. Doppler Radar measures the changes in the frequency of the signal it receives to determine the wind. How does Doppler Radar work?

The National Weather Service has installed a new type of Doppler Radar called NEXRAD Radar. NEXRAD stands for Next Generation Radar. This radar produces many different views of storms and rain that allows meteorologists to determine if a storm could be severe.
What is NEXRAD Radar?

Know the Lingo

FLOOD WATCH - means that an overflow of water from a river is possible for your area.

FLASH FLOOD WATCH - means that flash flooding is possible in or close to the watch area. Flash Flood Watches can be put into effect for as long as 12 hours, while heavy rains move into and across the area.

FLOOD WARNING - means flooding conditions are actually occurring in the warning area.

FLASH FLOOD WARNING - means that flash flooding is actually occurring in the warning area. A warning can also be issued as a result of torrential rains, a dam failure or snow thaw.
Click Here to see if there are any active warnings in your area.
Flood Safety Tips

BEFORE A FLOOD: Have a disaster plan and prepare a disaster supplies kit for your home and car. Include a first aid kit, canned food, can opener, bottled water, battery-operated radio, flashlight, protective clothing and written instructions on how to turn off electricity, gas, and water.
DURING A FLOOD: Move to a safe area quickly. Move to higher ground, like the highest floor of your home. Avoid areas subject to sudden flooding like low spots and canyons. Avoid already flooded areas. If a flowing stream of water is above your ankles stop, turn around and go the other way. Do not attempt to drive through a flooded road. The depth of the water is not obvious and the road may be washed away. If your car stalls, leave it and seek higher ground. Rapidly rising water may engulf the car, pick it up and sweep it away. Kids should never play around high water, storm drains or viaducts. Be cautious at night, because its harder to see flood dangers. If told to evacuate, do so immediately.
AFTER THE FLOOD: Always, boil drinking water. Electrical equipment should be checked and dried before used.
Rain Activities

Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on learning about precipitation. In this activity, kids will use a weather map to answer questions about precipitation falling across the country. Note: This is a PDF file, so you need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Pressure Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows how pressure is created in our atmosphere by sucking an egg in a bottle. This is a very cool experiment!

Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.Make A Barometer Experiment: Here is an experiment that allows the kids to make a barometer.

Evaporation Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows kids how evaporation takes place.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Wherever there is a shortage of rain over a long period of time, there is drought. Drought affects plants, animals, and people. It is a serious problem for farmers and for the people who depend on the crops they produce.

Drought may occur almost anywhere in the world. Deserts receive very little rain all year. They are sometimes said to be in a permanent drought. Places that have a rainy season and a dry season have seasonal drought during the dry season. Other places can experience drought at any time.

Drought results from changes in Earth's atmosphere. Some droughts are caused by shifts in the winds that normally bring rain to an area. Others are caused by changing ocean currents, which affect the temperature and moisture of the air.

Severe droughts can last for months or years. When this happens no crops will grow. As a result many people and animals may die of famine, or lack of food. Severe droughts often force people and animals to move to find water. Some farmers go to places where they think conditions will be better for their crops and animals. Some people give up farming altogether. They move to cities to find other types of work.

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Wherever there is a shortage of rain over a long period of time, there is drought. Drought affects plants, animals, and people. It is a serious problem for farmers and for...

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Hurricanes only form over really warm ocean water of 80°F or warmer. The atmosphere (the air) must cool off very quickly the higher you go. Also, the wind must be blowing in the same direction and at the same speed to force air upward from the ocean surface. Winds flow outward above the storm allowing the air below to rise. Hurricanes typically form between 5 to 15 degrees latitude north and south of the equator. The To learn more about hurricanes, Prepare a disaster supplies kit for your home and car. Include a first aid kit, canned food and a can opener, bottled water, battery-operated radio, flashlight, protective clothing and written instructions on how to turn off electricity, gas, and water. Have a NOAA weather radio handy with plenty of batteries, so you can listen to storm advisories. Have some cash handy as well, because following a hurricane, banks and ATMs may be temporarily closed. Make sure your car is filled with gasoline. Hurricanes

What is a hurricane?
A hurricane is a huge storm! It can be up to 600 miles across and have strong winds spiraling inward and upward at speeds of 75 to 200 mph. Each hurricane usually lasts for over a week, moving 10-20 miles per hour over the open ocean. Hurricanes gather heat and energy through contact with warm ocean waters. Evaporation from the seawater increases their power. Hurricanes rotate in a counter-clockwise direction around an "eye" in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise direction in the Southern Hemisphere. The center of the storm or "eye" is the calmest part. It has only light winds and fair weather. When they come onto land, the heavy rain, strong winds and large waves can damage buildings, trees and cars.

>Click Here to get your very own Hurricane Tracking Chart.

How do hurricanes form?
Coriolis Force is needed to create the spin in the hurricane and it becomes too weak near the equator, so hurricanes can never form there.

What is storm surge?
Storm surges are frequently the most devastating element of a hurricane. As a hurricane's winds spiral around and around the storm, they push water into a mound at the storm's center. This mound of water becomes dangerous when the storm reaches land because it causes flooding along the coast. The water piles up, unable to escape anywhere but on land as the storm carries it landward. A hurricane will cause more storm surge in areas where the ocean floor slopes gradually. This causes major flooding.
As you watch the storm-surge animations, notice the effect that the physical geography of each coastline has on storm surge. Also, note the waves on top of the ocean's surface. Wind, waves, and sea-level rise all contribute to storm-surge damage.

Shallow-Water Coastline

Deep-Water Coastline

With technology the way it is, there are computer models that allow forecasters to predict the amount of storm surge that will affect a coastal area. These are called Slosh Models and take into account a storm's strength, its path, how the ocean shallows, and the shape of the land. Then it calculates how much storm surge a hurricane will probably cause.

The Atlantic hurricane season is from June 1 to November 30, but most hurricanes occur during the fall months. The Eastern Pacific hurricane season is from May 15 to November 30. (Below is a graphic that shows you when hurricanes are most active across parts of the world.)
When does hurricane season start?

Who names hurricanes?
From 1950 to 1952, tropical cyclones of the North Atlantic Ocean were identified by the phonetic alphabet (Able-Baker-Charlie-etc.), but in 1953 the US Weather Bureau switched to women's names. The rest of the world eventually caught on, and naming rights now go by the World Meteorological Organization, which uses different sets of names depending on the part of the world the storm is in. Around the U.S., only women's names were used until 1979, when it was decided that they should alternate a list that included men's names too. There's 6 different name lists that alternate each year. If a hurricane does significant damage, its name is retired and replaced with another.
Atlantic Hurricane Names
Eastern Pacific Hurricane Names
Nothing except geography. Tropical storms occur in several of the world's oceans, and except for their names, they are essentially the same type of storm. In the Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Mexico, and the Eastern Pacific Ocean, they are called hurricanes. In the Western Pacific Ocean, they are called typhoons. In the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal, and Australia, these types of storms are called cyclones.
What is the difference between a hurricane and a typhoon?
(This is a satellite animation of Hurricane Georges, which struck the Mississippi Gulf coast in 1998.)

The brave "hurricane hunters" work for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Each mission lasts about ten hours, with the crews passing four to six times through the storm. The planes carry radar, sophisticated computers, and weather instruments that determine characteristics such as temperature, air pressure, wind speed, and wind direction inside the hurricane. The crews also release instruments that measure temperature, air pressure, and wind at different levels as the devices drop through the hurricane toward the ocean. By mission's end, NOAA can warn everyone in the hurricane's path. (Below is a satellite image of Hurricane Mitch back in October 1998. The Hurricane Hunters flew into the eye of Mitch just as this Category 5 hurricane with winds of 155 mph smacked right into Central America.)

Who are the "Hurricane Hunters"?
Coastal beach erosion is the wearing away of land, the removal of beach or dune sediments by wave action, tidal currents, wave currents, or drainage. Waves are generated by storms, wind, or hurricanes and can cause coastal erosion. This may take the form of long-term losses of sediment and rocks, or merely the temporary redistribution of coastal sediments.

What is coastal beach erosion?

Hurricanes...Past and Present
Tropical Tracks: Click to see the tracks of this year's storms.

Know the Lingo Past Hurricane Info: Click to find all the data and information about a specific hurricane by just knowing the year.
HURRICANE WATCH - Hurricane conditions with sustained winds of 74 mph or greater are possible in your area within the next 36 hours. This WATCH should trigger your family's disaster plan, and protective measures should be initiated. Especially, those actions that require extra time such as securing a boat and leaving a barrier island.
TROPICAL STORM WATCH - Tropical Storm conditions with sustained winds from 39 -74 mph are possible in your area within the next 36 hours.
HURRICANE WARNING - Hurricane conditions are expected in your area within 24 hours. Once this WARNING has been issued, your family should be in the process of completing protective actions and deciding the safest location to be during the storm.

COASTAL FLOOD WATCH - The possibility exists for the inundation of land areas along the coast within the next 12 to 36 hours.

COASTAL FLOOD WARNING - Land areas along the coast are expected to become, or have become, inundated by sea water above the typical tide action.

SMALL CRAFT ADVISORY - A small craft advisory is a type of warning issued by the National Weather Service, most frequently in coastal areas. It is issued when winds have reached, or are expected to reach within 12 hours, a speed marginally less than that which is considered gale force, usually 25-38 mph.

Click Here to see if there are any active warnings in your area.
Hurricane Stages
Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale

Category

Winds (MPH)

Pressure (Millibars)

Pressure (Inches)

Storm Surge
(Feet)

Damage

3

111-130

964-945

28.47-27.91

9'-12'

Extensive

Click Here to watch a variety of videos teaching you the ins and outs of nature's fury. I would like to give a special thanks to Pinellas County Emergency management for putting these instructional videos together.
Hurricane Safety Tips

BEFORE A HURRICANE: Have a disaster plan and a pet plan ready. Before a storm threatens, contact your veterinarian or local humane society for information on preparing your pets for an emergency. Board up windows and b ring in outdoor objects that could blow away. Make sure you know which county or parish you live in and k now where all the evacuation routes are.

Stay away from low-lying and flood prone areas. Always stay indoors during a hurricane, because strong winds will blow things around. Leave mobile homes and to go to a shelter. DURING A HURRICANE: If your home isn't on higher ground, go to a shelter. If emergency managers say to evacuate, then do so immediately.
AFTER A HURRICANE: Stay indoors until it is safe to come out. Check for injured or trapped people, without putting yourself in danger. Watch out for flooding which can happen after a hurricane. Do not attempt to drive in flooding water. Stay away from standing water. It may be electrically charged from underground or downed power lines. Don't drink tap water until officials say its safe to do so.

Evacuation Tips: Here is a list of tips on what you should do, if you chose to evacuate as a hurricane approaches.
Hurricane Activities
Hurricane Supply Checklist: Here is a list of what what you will need if you chose to stay at your home during a hurricane.
Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on learning about hurricane safety. In this activity, Owlie teaches kids about hurricanes and quizzes them about what they learned. Note: This is a PDF file, so you need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader.
Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on understanding hurricanes. Students will learn how wind speed increases the height and why higher waves occur in shallower water. This activity is for grades 6-8.

Lesson Plan: Here is a great interactive lesson plan on allowing kids to create their very own hurricane. It lets you try to create ideal hurricane conditions by changing the winds, latitude, moisture, and sea temperature. It even keeps score! This is a great activity for 5-8th graders.Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on elementary reading comprehension. This lesson contains a broader vocabulary, more hurricane facts, and more thought-provoking writing prompts. It works well for grades 3-5. Note: This is a PDF file, so you need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader. Lesson Plan: Here is a great interactive lesson plan that lets kids aim a hurricane. It lets you move the hurricane symbol, high pressure symbol and low pressure symbol to track your very own hurricane. Sometimes your hurricane will make landfall, other times it misses the U.S. all together. It lets kid understand how important the setup of weather impacts where hurricanes go.

Pressure Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows how pressure is created in our atmosphere by sucking an egg in a bottle. This is a very cool experiment!
Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.
Make A Barometer Experiment: Here is an experiment that allows the kids to make a barometer.

Evaporation Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows kids how evaporation takes place.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Nor'easters can occur in the eastern United States any time between October and April, when moisture and cold air are plentiful. A Nor'easter is named for the winds that blow in from the northeast and drive the storm up the east coast along the Gulf Stream, a band of warm water that lies off the Atlantic coast. They are known for dumping heavy amounts of rain and snow, producing hurricane-force winds, and creating high surfs that cause severe beach erosion and coastal flooding. Winter Storms

How do winter storms form?
Winter storms derive their energy from the clash of two air masses of different temperatures and moisture levels. Winter storms usually form when an air mass of cold, dry, Canadian air moves south and interacts with a warm, moist air mass moving north from the Gulf of Mexico. The point where these two air masses meet is called a front. If cold air advances and pushes away the warm air, it forms a cold front. When warm air advances, it rides up over the denser, cold air mass to form a warm front. If neither air mass advances, it forms a stationary front.

What are snowflakes?
Snowflakes are made of ice crystals. Each snowflake is six-sided and made of as many as 200 ice crystals. Snowflakes form in clouds where the temperature is below freezing. The ice crystals form around tiny bits of dirt that has been carried up into the atmosphere by the wind. As the snow crystals grow, they become heavier and fall toward the ground. Why is snow white?
Bright snow blinds us with its gleaming white color because it reflects beams of white light. Instead of absorbing light, snow's complex structure prevents the light from shining through its lattice formation. A beam of white sunlight entering a snow bank is so quickly scattered by a zillion ice crystals and air pockets that most of the light comes bouncing right back out of the snow bank. What little sunlight is absorbed by snow is absorbed equally over the wavelengths of visible light thus giving snow its white appearance. So while many natural objects get their blue, red, and yellow colors from absorbing light, snow is stuck with its white color because it reflects light.

What is thundersnow? How is snow formed?
Snow is commonly formed when water vapor undergoes deposition, which is when water vapor changes directly to ice without first becoming a liquid, high in the atmosphere at a temperature of less than 32°F and then falls to the ground. What is sleet?
Sleet is just rain drops that freeze into ice pellets before reaching the ground. Sleet usually bounces when hitting a surface and does not stick to objects. However, it can accumulate like snow and cause a hazard to motorists.
What is an ice storm?
An ice storm is a type of winter storm caused by freezing rain. The U.S. National Weather Service defines an ice storm as a storm which results in the accumulation of at least 0.25-inch of ice on exposed surfaces.
What is freezing rain?
Freezing rain is just rain that falls onto a surface with a temperature below freezing. This causes it to freeze to surfaces, such as trees, cars, and roads, forming a coating or glaze of ice. Even small accumulations of ice can cause a significant hazard. How do ice storms form?
Ice storms form when a layer of warm air is between two layers of cold air. Frozen precipitation melts while falling into the warm air layer, and then proceeds to refreeze in the cold layer above the ground. This creates freezing rain or a glaze of ice.

What is frost? What is a frost quake?
Frost is white ice crystals that form on a surface, like the ground or leaves of a plant. Frost is created when the air temperature drops below freezing and the water vapor in the air freezes into ice crystals.

How is lake-effect snow formed?
As the cold air flows over the warm lake water, the relatively warm water heats the air's bottom layer as lake moisture evaporates into the cold air. Since warm air is lighter or less dense than cold air, the heated air rises and begins to cool. As the air cools, the moisture that evaporated into it condenses and forms clouds and snow begins falling from the cloud if the air is humid enough. (Graphic Credit: USA TODAY.) What is a Nor'easter?

What is Wind Chill? What is an Alberta Clipper? Click Here to calculate the Wind Chill.
An Alberta clipper is an area of low pressure that generally forms over Alberta, Canada, east of the Rocky Mountains. They develop east of the Rockies because air flowing eastward over the mountains creates favorable conditions. Once an Alberta Clipper forms it usually moves very rapidly to the southeast across the USA's northern Plains and then to the east off the mid-Atlantic Coast. Clippers usually cause only light precipitation with very few producing major snowstorms. However, if conditions are favorable, some Alberta clippers can rapidly intensify off the East Coast once the storm taps the relatively warm moist air over the Atlantic Ocean. The storms that rapidly intensify sometimes spread heavy snow over New England and southeastern Canada. Generally, the main weather features associated with Alberta clippers are some light snow and a reinforcement of cold air over the USA.
What is frostbite? How do blizzards form?

A blizzard is a long-lasting snowstorm with very strong winds and intense snowfall. You need three things to have a blizzard; cold air at the surface, lots of moisture, and lift. Warm air must rise over cold air.
What is an avalanche?
An avalanche is a moving mass of snow that may contain ice, soil, rocks, and uprooted trees. The height of a mountain, the steepness of its slope, and the type of snow lying on it all help determine the likelihood of an avalanche. Avalanches begin when an unstable mass of snow breaks away from a mountainside and moves downhill. The growing river of snow picks up speed as it rushes down the mountain. Avalanches have been known to reach speeds of 245 miles an hour (394 kilometers per hour)—about four times as fast as the speediest downhill skier.
Click Here to learn more about Avalanche Saftey.
Know the Lingo
WINTER WEATHER ADVISORIES - Issued for accumulations of snow, freezing rain, freezing drizzle, and sleet which will cause significant inconveniences and, if caution is not exercised, could lead to life-threatening situations.

Thundersnow is when thunder and lighting occur during a snowstorm. This occurs most often in late winter or early spring. To get thundersnow, you need a mass of cold air on top of warm air, plus moist air closer to the ground. Thundersnow starts out like a summer thunderstorm. The sun heats the ground and pushes masses of warm, moist air upward, creating unstable air columns. As it rises, the moisture condenses to form clouds, which are jostled by internal turbulence. The "tricky part" for making thundersnow is creating that atmospheric instability in the wintertime. For thundersnow to occur, the air layer closer to the ground has to be warmer than the layers above, but still cold enough to create snow. During thundersnow events, heavy snowfall is to be expected. In some cases, two inches per hour is possible.

Click Here to see if there are any active warnings in your area.

Winter Storm Safety Tips
BEFORE A WINTER STORM: Have a disaster plan and prepare a disaster supplies kit for your home and car. Include a first aid kit, emergency food supply, bottled water, battery-operated radio, flashlight, protective clothing, and blankets. Don't forget, be aware of changing weather. DURING A WINTER STORM: Stay indoors and dress warmly. Eat regularly, because food provides the body with energy for producing its own heat. Also, drink lots of water. If you must go outside, wear layered clothing, mittens and a hat. Watch for signs of hypothermia and frostbite. Remember to keep dry. Always change wet clothing to prevent the loss of body heat. If you must drive, carry a cell phone. Always, keep the gas tank full. Don't forget, let someone know where you're going, just in case your car gets stuck. If you're car gets stuck, stay with it and wait for help unless help is visible within 100 yards. Use maps and car mats to stay warm.

AFTER A WINTER STORM: Avoid driving until conditions have improved. Avoid overexertion! Heart attacks from shoveling snow are the leading cause of deaths during the winter. Also, check on neighbors to make sure they're okay.

Frost quakes are non-tectonic seismic events, meaning they are not caused by the shifting of the Earth's tectonic plates. Also known as cryoseisms, frost quakes are caused by a sudden rapid freezing of ground and bedrock, usually when temperatures go from above freezing to below zero. As moisture absorbed in the rock and soil freezes, it expands. This puts a great amount of stress on the areas around it. Eventually, the stress is too much and the soil and rock will crack in an "explosive" manner, creating a loud sound and even shaking the ground surface. Since temperatures are coldest in the overnight hours, most people experience frost quakes in the middle of the night. Winter Storm Activities
Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on learning about winter weather. In this activity, kids investigate aspects of winter weather, such as temperature and wind. They familiarize themselves with weather-related words. It's a great activity for K-2nd graders.

Cold air moves over warm water and is warmed from below. Moisture evaporates in the air.

Warm moist air rises downwind of lakes and forms heavy snow.

Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on learning about winter weather. In this activity, kids learn how winter storms form and about the different types of fronts. It's a great activity for 3rd-5th graders. Note: This is a PDF file, so you need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader.
Measuring Snow Experiment: Here is a great experiment that lets kids measure snow. They let the snow melt and then measure it again. It teaches kids that snow is very dense and is why it holds more space than water.

The wind chill is the temperature your body feels when the air temperature is combined with the wind speed. The higher the wind speed the faster exposed areas of your body lose heat and the colder you feel.Melting Snow Experiment: Here is another experiment that teaches kids the difference between the freezing and melting process. It allows kids to take the temperature of a glass of snow. Then, watch the snow melt and observe how the temperature changed.

Frost Experiment: Here is a great experiment that lets kids make frost. They can see how dew turns into frost in a matter of minutes.Examining Snowflakes Experiment: Here is a great experiment that lets kids see snowflakes up close. They can examine the snowflake's six sides.
Pressure Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows how pressure is created in our atmosphere by sucking an egg in a bottle. This is a very cool experiment!
Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.
Make A Barometer Experiment: Here is an experiment that allows the kids to make a barometer.

Evaporation Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows kids how evaporation takes place.

Frostbite is damage to the skin due to prolonged exposure to cold temperatures, usually below 32° F.

WINTER STORM WATCH - Alerts the public to the possibility of a blizzard, heavy snow, heavy freezing rain, or heavy sleet. Winter Storm Watches are usually issued 12 to 48 hours before the beginning of a winter storm.

WINTER STORM WARNING - Issued when hazardous winter weather in the form of heavy snow, heavy freezing rain, or heavy sleet is occurring. Winter Storm Warnings are usually issued 12 to 24 hours before the event is expected.

BLIZZARD WARNING - Issued for sustained or gusty winds of 35 mph or more, and falling or blowing snow creating visibilities at or below 1/4 mile. These conditions should persist for 3 hours.

FROST/FREEZE WARNING - Issued when below freezing temperatures are expected.

LAKE EFFECT SNOW ADVISORY - Issued when accumulation of lake effect snow will cause significant inconvenience.

LAKE EFFECT SNOW WARNING - Issued when heavy lake effect snow is occurring.

WIND CHILL ADVISORY - Issued when the wind chill temperature is forecast to be between -15°F to -24°F.

WIND CHILL WARNING - Issued when the wind chill temperature is forecast to be -25°F or lower.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Wind

What is wind?
Wind is air in motion. It is produced by the uneven heating of the earth's surface by the sun. Since the earth's surface is made of various land and water formations, it absorbs the sun's radiation unevenly. Two factors are necessary to specify wind: speed and direction.

What causes the wind to blow?
As the sun warms the Earth's surface, the atmosphere warms too. Some parts of the Earth receive direct rays from the sun all year and are always warm. Other places receive indirect rays, so the climate is colder. Warm air, which weighs less than cold air, rises. Then cool air moves in and replaces the rising warm air. This movement of air is what makes the wind blow.

What is a windstorm? A windstorm is just a storm with high winds or violent gusts but little or no rain.

What is a gust front?
A gust front is the leading edge of cool air rushing down and out from a thunderstorm. There are two main reasons why the air flows out of some thunderstorms so rapidly. The primary reason is the presence of relatively dry air in the lower atmosphere. This dry air causes some of the rain falling through it to evaporate, which cools the air. Since cool air sinks (just as warm air rises), this causes a down-rush of air that spreads out at the ground. The edge of this rapidly spreading cool pool of air is the gust front. The second reason is that the falling precipitation produces a drag on the air, forcing it downward. If the wind following the gust front is intense and damaging, the windstorm is known as a downburst.

What is a derecho? What is a downburst?
A downburst is created by an area of significantly rain-cooled air that, after hitting ground level, spreads out in all directions producing strong winds. Unlike winds in a tornado, winds in a downburst are directed outwards from the point where it hits land or water. Dry downbursts are associated with thunderstorms with very little rain, while wet downbursts are created by thunderstorms with high amounts of rainfall.
A derecho is a widespread and long-lived windstorm that is associated with a fast-moving band of severe thunderstorms. They can produce significant damage to property and pose a serious threat life, primarily by downburst winds. To be classified as a derecho, the path length of the storm has to be at least 280 miles long. Widths may vary from 50-300 miles. Derechos are usually not associated with a cold front, but a stationary front. They occur mostly in July, but can occur at anytime during the spring and summer.
What is the jet stream?

The jet stream is a fast flowing, river of air found in the atmosphere at around 12 km above the surface of the Earth just under the tropopause. They form at the boundaries of adjacent air masses with significant differences in temperature, such as of the polar region and the warmer air to the south. Because of the effect of the Earth's rotation the streams flow west to east, propagating in a serpentine or wave-like manner at lower speeds than that of the actual wind within the flow.

What is a monsoon?
A monsoon is a seasonal wind, found especially in Asia that reverses direction between summer and winter and often brings heavy rains. In the summer, a high pressure area lies over the Indian Ocean while a low exists over the Asian continent. The air masses move from the high pressure over the ocean to the low over the continent, bringing moisture-laden air to south Asia. During winter, the process is reversed and a low sits over the Indian Ocean while a high lies over the Tibetan plateau so air flows down the Himalaya and south to the ocean. The migration of trade winds and westerlies also contributes to the monsoons. Smaller monsoons take place in equatorial Africa, northern Australia, and, to a lesser extent, in the southwestern United States.

What are the Santa Ana Winds?
The Santa Ana winds are strong, extremely dry down-slope winds that originate inland and affect coastal Southern California and northern Baja California. Santa Ana winds blow mostly in autumn and winter, but can arise at other times of the year. They can range from hot to cold, depending on the prevailing temperatures in the source regions, the Great Basin and upper Mojave Desert. The winds are known especially for the hot dry weather (often the hottest of the year) that they bring in the fall, and are infamous for fanning regional wildfires. For these reasons, they are sometimes known as the "devil winds" across Southern California.

What are the global wind patterns? The equator receives the Sun's direct rays. Here, air is heated and rises, leaving low pressure areas behind. Moving to about thirty degrees north and south of the equator, the warm air from the equator begins to cool and sink. Between thirty degrees latitude and the equator, most of the cooling sinking air moves back to the equator. The rest of the air flows toward the poles.

The trade winds are just air movements toward the equator. They are warm, steady breezes that blow almost continuously. The Coriolis Effect makes the trade winds appear to be curving to the west, whether they are traveling to the equator from the south or north. What are the trade winds?

The doldrums is an area of calm weather. The trade winds coming from the south and the north meet near the equator. These converging trade winds produce general upward winds as they are heated, so there are no steady surface winds.
What are the doldrums?

Between thirty and sixty degrees latitude, the winds that move toward the poles appear to curve to the east. Because winds are named from the direction in which they originate, these winds are called prevailing westerlies. Prevailing westerlies in the Northern Hemisphere are responsible for many of the weather movements across the United States and Canada.

What are the prevailing westerlies?
At about sixty degrees latitude in both hemispheres, the prevailing westerlies join with the polar easterlies to reduce upward motion. The polar easterlies form when the atmosphere over the poles cools. This cool air then sinks and spreads over the surface. As the air flows away from the poles, it is turned to the west by the Coriolis effect. Again, because these winds begin in the east, they are called easterlies.

What are the polar easterlies?
On a warm summer day along the coast, this differential heating of land and sea leads to the development of local winds called sea breezes. As air above the land surface is heated by radiation from the Sun, it expands and begins to rise, being lighter than the surrounding air. To replace the rising air, cooler air is drawn in from above the surface of the sea. This is the sea breeze, and can offer a pleasant cooling influence on hot summer afternoons.

What is a sea breeze?
A land breeze occurs at night when the land cools faster than the sea. In this case, it is air above the warmer surface water that is heated and rises, pulling in air from the cooler land surface.

What is a land breeze?
Wind is the fastest growing source of electricity in the world. It's often one of the least expensive forms of renewable power available. Some experts say it can sometimes be the cheapest form of any kind of power. Generating power from the wind leaves no dangerous waste products behind. Best of all, its supply is unlimited.

Windmills work because they slow down the speed of the wind. The wind flows over the airfoil shaped blades causing lift, like the effect on airplane wings, causing them to turn. The blades are connected to a drive shaft that turns an electric generator to produce electricity.
How is wind helpful to Earth?

Many local wind systems have their own names. Here's a few! How do windmills work?

What are some different types of wind names?

chinook-(westerly wind off the eastern side of the Rocky Mountains)santa ana-(easterly towards Southern California )
scirocco-(southerly from North Africa to southern Europe) mistral-(northwesterly from central France to Mediterranean)
marin-(southeasterly from Mediterranean to France)
bora-(northeasterly from eastern Europe to Italy)

Beaufort number

Wind speed
MPH

Wind Speed
Knots

Description

Sea conditions

Land conditions

10

55-63

48-55

Storm

Very high waves.
The sea surface is white

Trees uprooted. Considerable structural damage

gregale-(northeasterly from Greece)
etesian-(northwesterly from Greece)
libeccio-(southwesterly towards Italy)
Beaufort Scale
The Beaufort scale is an empirical measure for the intensity of the weather based mainly on wind power. The scale was created by the British naval commander Sir Francis Beaufort around 1806.

Wind Activities
Lesson Plan: Here is a great activity the shows students how the winds work across the globe.

Wind Experiment: Here is a great experiment that allows the kids to find out what's in the wind. The kids will be very surprised at what they see!

Anemometer Experiment: Here is another great experiment that lets kids make an anemometer or wind vane.
Pinwheel Experiment: Here is an experiment that allows the kids to make a pinwheel to see how wind is created.
Windsock Experiment: Here is an experiment that allows the kids to make a windsock.
Pressure Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows how pressure is created in our atmosphere by sucking an egg in a bottle. This is a very cool experiment!

Make A Barometer Experiment: Here is an experiment that allows the kids to make a barometer.

Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.Evaporation Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows kids how evaporation takes place.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Weather Forecasting

How do meteorologists forecast the weather?
Weather forecasting is a prediction of what the weather will be like in an hour, tomorrow, or next week. Weather forecasting involves a combination of computer models, observations, and a knowledge of trends and patterns. By using these methods, reasonable accurate forecasts can be made up to seven days in advance.

What are weather station symbols?
Weather symbols are used on my weather maps as shorthand for the conditions at weather observing stations.
Click Here to see a complete list of all the weather station symbols.
Click Here for an easy print out of the different weather station symbols.

What is a High Pressure System?
A high pressure system is a whirling mass of cool, dry air that generally brings fair weather and light winds. When viewed from above, winds spiral out of a high-pressure center in a clockwise rotation in the Northern Hemisphere. These bring sunny skies. A high pressure system is represented as a big, blue H.

What is a Low Pressure System?
A low pressure system is a whirling mass of warm, moist air that generally brings stormy weather with strong winds. When viewed from above, winds spiral into a low-pressure center in a counterclockwise rotation in the Northern Hemisphere. A low pressure system is represented as a big, red L.
H
What is a dew point?

What is an air mass?
An air mass is an extremely large body of air whose properties of temperature and moisture content (humidity), at any given altitude, are fairly similar in any horizontal direction. Air masses can cover large (hundreds of miles) areas. Air masses can control the weather for a relatively long time period: from a period of days, to months. Most weather occurs along the periphery of these air masses at boundaries called fronts. There are 4 general air mass classifications categorized according to the source region: polar, tropical, continental and marine.
The dew point is the temperature at which water starts to condense out of a particular air mass. The dew point temperature changes only when the moisture content of the air changes. The higher the dew point, the greater the moisture content is in the air.
What is humidity?
What type of air masses affect the United States?
Humidity is the amount of water vapor in the air.

What is relative humidity?
Relative humidity is the ratio of water vapor contained in the air compared to the maximum amount of moisture that the air can hold at that specific temperature and pressure. Humans are very sensitive to humidity, as the skin relies on the air to get rid of moisture. The process of sweating is your body's attempt to keep cool and maintain its current temperature. If the air is at 100-percent relative humidity, sweat will not evaporate into the air. As a result, we feel much hotter than the actual temperature when the relative humidity is high. If the relative humidity is low, we can feel much cooler than the actual temperature because our sweat evaporates easily, cooling us off. What is a front?
A front is a boundary between two different air masses, resulting in stormy weather. A front usually is a line of separation between warm and cold air masses.

How do you identify a front on a surface weather map or by your own weather observations?
L
What is a cold front?
A cold front is a boundary between two air masses, one cold and the other warm, moving so that the colder air replaces the warmer air. A cold front is represented as a blue line with the teeth pointing toward the direction on movement.

What is a warm front?
A warm front is a boundary between two air masses, one cool and the other warm, moving so that the warmer air replaces the cooler air. A warm front is represented as a red line with half circles pointing toward the direction on movement.

What is a occluded front? What is a trough?
An occluded front is a combination of two fronts that form when a cold front catches up and overtakes a warm front. An occluded front is represented as a purple line with teeth and half circles. What is a stationary front?
A stationary front is a boundary between two air masses that more or less doesn't move, but some stationary fronts can wobble back and forth for several hundred miles a day. A stationary front is represented as an alternating warm and cold front symbol.

1.) Polar latitudes (P) - located poleward of 60 degrees north and south

2.) Tropical latitudes (T) - located within about 25 degrees of the equator

3.) Continental (c) - located over large land masses, dry

4.) Marine (m) - located over the oceans

What is a weather satellite?
A weather satellite is a type of satellite that is primarily used to monitor the weather and climate of the Earth. Satellites can be either polar orbiting, seeing the same swath of the Earth every 12 hours, or geostationary, hovering over the same spot on Earth by orbiting over the equator while moving at the speed of the Earth's rotation. These meteorological satellites see more than clouds and cloud systems. City lights, fires, effects of pollution, auroras, sand and dust storms, snow cover, ice mapping, boundaries of ocean currents, energy flows, etc., are other types of environmental information collected using weather satellites.
We can then make combinations of the above to describe various types of air masses.
What is radar?

How does Doppler Radar work?

What is NEXRAD Radar?
The National Weather Service has installed a new type of Doppler Radar called NEXRAD Radar. NEXRAD stands for Next Generation Radar. This radar produces many different views of storms and rain that allows meteorologists to determine if a storm could be severe. Can animals predict weather?
If your dog always comes inside right before it rains, you may think that animals can predict the weather. It's probably more accurate to say that animals react to certain environmental signals that accompany weather changes, not to the weather itself. A prevalent opinion is that animals can detect certain events, like earthquakes, as soon as they happen, even if the originating event is a great distance away. The majority of researchers say that animals make greater use of their existing five senses, especially when compared to humans. The most critical sense is hearing.
Doppler Radar gets its name from the Doppler Effect. Have you ever listened to a train whistle as it was coming toward you? You probably noticed that the pitch of the whistle changed as the train passed you and moved away. This change in the frequency of sound is called the Doppler Effect. Doppler Radar measures the changes in the frequency of the signal it receives to determine the wind. Weather Forecasting Activities
Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on learning how to forecast. In this activity, kids learn about different forecasting tricks. What is Doppler Radar?
Doppler Radar detects precipitation intensity, wind direction and speed, and provides estimates of hail size and rainfall amounts. Doppler Radar gives forecasters the capability of providing early detection of severe thunderstorms that may bring strong damaging winds, large hail, heavy rain, and possibly tornadoes. Combined with satellites, radar gives forecasters the ultimate tools to provide accurate forecasts and advanced severe weather warnings.Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on weather symbols for younger kids. This lesson plan requires kids to match the weather symbols to words. You will need to download this file to then be able to print off copies for your students.
Radar is an electronic instrument, which determines the direction and distance of objects that reflect radio energy back to the radar site. It stands for Radio Detection and Ranging. This is what meteorologists use to see rain or snow.
The Doppler Effect Experiment: Here is a an experiment that teaches kids what the Doppler Effect is. They can learn how the Doppler Effect works and why Doppler Radar is such an important tool in weather forecasting.

cP continental polar cold, dry, stable

cT continental tropical hot, dry, stable air aloft, unstable surface air

mP maritime polar cool, moist, and unstable

mT maritime tropical warm, moist, usually unstable

Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.
There are many types of air masses that can affect the U.S., since it is such a large country. Below are a few examples:

cP - wintertime bitter cold can extent to Southern U.S. and even Florida causing crop damage. Require long, clear nights, which means strong radiational cooling of air near the surface. A stable air mass. Little moisture added so air is dry

mP - Winter cP air moves over a region such as the NE Pacific, picking up some warmth and moisture from the warmer ocean. In the case of the Pacific NW mountains force the air to rise (orographic lifting) causing rain.

mT - wintertime source for the SW U.S. is the subtropical East Pacific Ocean. mT air that influences weather east of the Rocky Mountains comes from the Gulf of Mexico, but only influences winter weather in the SE states. Occasionally, slow moving weather systems in SW flow aloft can draw up moisture at mid and low levels producing precipitation.

cT - Continental tropical air usually only influences the U.S. in summertime as warm, dry air is pumped up off of the Mexican Plateau. It is usually fairly stable and dry, and if it becomes stagnant over the Midwest, results in a drought. Deaths associated with the 1995 heat wave in the Midwest were the result of cT and mT air which stagnated over the central and eastern part of the U.S.

Look for: Sharp temperature changes over a relatively short distance, change in moisture content, rapid shifts in wind direction, pressure changes, clouds and precipitation patterns.

A trough on a weather map is an elongated area of relatively low pressure. Troughs bring cloudy and rainy weather. A trough is represented by a hash mark line.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Lightning

What is lightning?
Lightning is a bright flash of electricity produced by a thunderstorm. All thunderstorms produce lightning and are very dangerous. If you hear the sound of thunder, then you are in danger from lightning. Lightning kills and injures more people each year than hurricanes or tornadoes; between 75 to 100 people.

What causes lightning?
Lightning is an electric current. Within a thundercloud way up in the sky, many small bits of ice (frozen raindrops) bump into each other as they move around in the air. All of those collisions create an electric charge. After a while, the whole cloud fills up with electrical charges. The positive charges or protons form at the top of the cloud and the negative charges or electrons form at the bottom of the cloud. Since opposites attract, that causes a positive charge to build up on the ground beneath the cloud. The grounds electrical charge concentrates around anything that sticks up, such as mountains, people, or single trees. The charge coming up from these points eventually connects with a charge reaching down from the clouds and - zap - lightning strikes!

Have you ever rubbed your feet across carpet and then touched a metal door handle? If so, then you know that you can get shocked! Lightning works in the same way.

Click Here to see where lightning is currently striking across the U.S.
Lightning is approximately 54,000 degrees Fahrenheit. That is six times hotter than the surface of the sun!
How hot is lightning?

Lightning seems to be clear or a white-yellow color, but it really depends on the background.
What color is lightning?

Thunder is caused by lightning. When a lightning bolt travels from the cloud to the ground it actually opens up a little hole in the air, called a channel. Once then light is gone the air collapses back in and creates a sound wave that we hear as thunder. The reason we see lightning before we hear thunder is because light travels faster than sound!

What causes thunder?
If you see dark clouds, then lightning could be present, but the best thing you can do is to listen for thunder. If you hear thunder, then you need to go indoors or get in a car. Don't be outside, where lightning could strike! If your hair stands on end or your skin starts to tingle, lightning maybe about to strike. Get down on your hands and knees and keep your head tucked in. Do not lay flat, because it can give lightning a better chance of strike you.

How do you know if lightning is nearby?
Within those distant thunderstorms, the lightning bolts can be seen as much as 100 miles from us, depending on the height of the bolt, the clarity of the air, and our elevation. Thunder, in comparison, has a much shorter range of detection - usually less than 15 miles in a quiet rural setting and under 5 miles in a noisy city environment.

How far away can you see lightning and hear thunder?
All lightning is dangerous, but cloud-to-ground lightning is the most dangerous type of lightning. Most cloud-to-ground lightning strikes come from the negatively charged bottom of the cloud traveling to the positively charged ground below.

Why are you less likely to see static electricity in the summer?
In the summer, our dew points are much higher due to warm and humid air coming from the Gulf of Mexico and that is why we have humid weather. In the winter, our dew points are much lower due to cold and direr air coming from Canada. The lower the dew point the better it is to create static electricity, so that's why you see it more in the winter. Cloud-to-ground lightning bolts strike the tall objects, like trees and buildings. These lightning strikes can cause fire and property damage. If you're the tallest object, then lighting can strike you. Lightning is the second weather related killed.
What is cloud-to-ground lightning?

Intracloud lightning is the most common type of lightning. This occurs when there are both positive and negative charges within the same cloud. Usually, the process takes place within the cloud and looks like a bright flash of light which flickers.

Intercloud lightning is less common. It's when a lightning strike occurs when there are positive and negative charges within different clouds and the strike travels in the air between them.

What is intracloud lightning?
Forked lighting appears as jagged lines of light. They can have several branches. Forked lightning can be seen shooting from the clouds to the ground, from one cloud to another cloud, or from a cloud out into the air. This lightning can strike up to 10 miles away from a thunderstorm.

What is intercloud lightning?

Sheet lightning appears as flashes of light that seem to light up or illuminate entire clouds.

What is forked lightning?
Heat lightning is a term used to describe lightning flashes that are too far away from you to hear the thunder. The reason that it is called heat lightning is that it appears most often on a hot summer day when the sky is clear overhead.

High-altitude lightning has been given other names such as "red sprites," "green elves," and "blue jets." This form of lightning appears as brightly colored flashes, high above thunderstorms. You can't see these types of lightning from the ground. What is sheet lightning?

Ribbon lightning is when a bolt of lightning separates due to wind and appears as parallel lightning streaks.
What is heat lightning?

Chain or bead lightning is when a lightning bolt is broken into dotted lines while fading.

What is high-altitude lightning?
Ball lightning is a rare form of lightning. It usually appears as a reddish, luminous ball, but can come in any color. Ball lightning is usually spherical in shape and about one foot in diameter. Hissing noises originate from such balls and they sometimes make a loud noise when they explode.

What is ribbon lightning?

St. Elmo's Fire appears as a blue or greenish glow above pointed objects on the ground. It is created when tiny positively charged sparks reach up in response to negatively charges in the air or clouds above the ground. If a thunderstorm is nearby, St. Elmo's Fire might be seen right before a lightning strike.

What is chain or bead lightning?
Anvil lightning is a type of lightning referred to as "the bolt from the blue" because it often appears suddenly from a seemingly cloudless sky. A bolt at the top of a thunderstorm arcs away from the main cloud and strikes the ground where the skies above often appear clear.

What is ball lightning?
Yes, you can use thunder to tell how far away a storm is. Next time you see a storm, count the number of seconds between when you see the lightning and hear the thunder. Take the number of seconds and divide by 5 and that will tell you how far away the storm is in miles. For example: If you counted 10 seconds between the lightning and the thunder, the lightning is 2 miles away!

What is St. Elmo's Fire?

What is anvil lightning?

Can you tell how far away a storm is?

Know the Lingo

SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WATCH - A severe thunderstorm (damaging winds of 58 miles per hour or more, or 1" hail in diameter or greater) is likely to develop in your area.

PROTONS - They are particles with a positive charge. SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WARNING - A severe thunderstorm (damaging winds of 58 miles per hour or more, or hail three-fourths of an inch in diameter or greater) is taking place in your area.
ELECTRONS - They are particles with a negative charge.

STATIC ELECTRICITY - It is a form of electricity that is created when an object has too many electrons, giving it a negative charge.

LEADERS - A channel of charged air created by excess electrons in a thunderstorm cloud. A leader reaches from the cloud to the ground below, looking for positive charges.

RETURN STROKE - It's an electrical charge that travels from the ground to a thundercloud. This return stroke releases tremendous energy, bright light and thunder.

IF YOU'RE INDOORS: Avoid water. It's a great conductor of electricity, so do not take a shower, wash your hands, wash dishes or do laundry. Do not use a corded telephone. Lightning may strike exterior phone lines. Do not use electric equipment like computers and appliances during a storm. Stay away from windows and doors and stay off porches.
STREAMERS - A channel of charged air created by protons on the ground. They are created when leaders are created and reach from the ground to the sky looking for a leader to connect with.
IF SOMEONE IS STRUCK BY LIGHTNING: Call for help. Call 9-1-1 or send for help immediately. The injured person does not carry an electrical charge, so it is okay to touch them.

Know the Facts
A lightning flash is no more than one inch wide.

What we see as a flash of lightning may actually be four different strokes in exactly the same place, one right after another. That's why lightning appears to flicker.
Click Here to see if there are any active warnings in your area.

Lightning Safety Tips

IF YOU'RE OUTDOORS: Keep an eye at the sky. Look for darkening skies, flashes of lightning, or increasing winds. Lightning often proceeds rain, so don't wait for the rain to begin. If you hear the sound of thunder, go to a safe place immediately. The best place to go is a sturdy building or a car, but make sure the windows in the car are shut. Avoid sheds, picnic areas, baseball dugouts and bleachers. If there is no shelter around you, stay away from trees. Crouch down in the open area, keeping twice as far away from a tree as far as it is tall. Put your feet together and place your hands over your ears to minimize hearing damage from thunder. If you're with a group of people stay about 15 feet from each other. Stay out of water, because it's a great conductor of electricity. Swimming, wading, snorkeling and scuba diving are not safe. Also, don't stand in puddles and avoid metal. Stay away from clotheslines, fences, and drop your backpacks because they often have metal on them. If you're playing an outdoor activity, wait at least 30 minutes after the last observed lightning strike or thunder. Lightning Activities Lightning Experiment: Here is a great experiment that allows kids to make lightning in their mouth. It's a great way for them to understand how lightning works.Static Electricity Experiment: Here is an experiment that allows the kids to learn about static electricity by sticking a balloon to a wall. This teaches kids about the positive and negative charges and where they come from.

Static Electricity Experiment: Here is another static electricity experiment that bends water. This teaches kids about the positive and negative charges and where they come from.
Static Electricity Experiment: Here is yet another static electricity experiment with using a balloon and your hair. This teaches kids about the positive and negative charges and where they come from.
Thunder Experiment: This experiment allows kids to make thunder, in a way that allows them to understand how it is made by lightning.
Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Clouds

What are clouds?
A cloud is a large collection of very tiny droplets of water or ice crystals. The droplets are so small and light that they can float in the air.
How are clouds formed?

All air contains water, but near the ground it is usually in the form of an invisible gas called water vapor. When warm air rises, it expands and cools. Cool air can't hold as much water vapor as warm air, so some of the vapor condenses onto tiny pieces of dust that are floating in the air and forms a tiny droplet around each dust particle. When billions of these droplets come together they become a visible cloud.

Why are clouds white?
Since light travels as waves of different lengths, each color has its very own unique wavelength. Clouds are white because their water droplets or ice crystals are large enough to scatter the light of the seven wavelengths (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet), which combine to produce white light.

Why do clouds turn gray?
Clouds are made up of tiny water droplets or ice crystals, usually a mixture of both. The water and ice scatter all light, making clouds appear white. If the clouds get thick enough or high enough all the light above does not make it through, hence the gray or dark look. Also, if there are lots of other clouds around, their shadow can add to the gray or multicolored gray appearance.

Why do clouds float? A cloud is made up of liquid water droplets. A cloud forms when air is heated by the sun. As it rises, it slowly cools it reaches the saturation point and water condenses, forming a cloud. As long as the cloud and the air that its made of is warmer than the outside air around it, it floats!

Clouds move with the wind. High cirrus clouds are pushed along by the jet stream, sometimes traveling at more than 100 miles-per-hour. When clouds are part of a thunderstorm they usually travel at 30 to 40 mph. How do clouds move?

Why do clouds form at different heights in the atmosphere?
The characteristics of clouds are dictated by the elements available, including the amount of water vapor, the temperatures at that height, the wind, and the interplay of other air masses.
There are many different types of fog, but fog is mostly formed when southerly winds bring warm, moist air into a region, possibly ending a cold outbreak. As the warm, moist air flows over much colder soil or snow, dense fog often forms. Warm, moist air is cooled from below as it flows over a colder surface. If the air is near saturation, moisture will condense out of the cooled air and form fog. With light winds, the fog near the ground can become thick and reduce visibilities to zero. How is fog formed?
(Graphic Credit: USA TODAY.)

You need warm air! Southerly winds bring warm, moist air over cold ground or snow.

Fog Forms! Moisture condenses into fog as air is cooled from below.

Cloud Chart

Cloud Group

Cloud Height

Cloud Types

High Clouds = Cirrus

Above 18,000 feet

Cirrus
Cirrostratus
Cirrocumulus

Middle Clouds = Alto

6,500 feet to 18,000 feet

Altostratus
Altocumulus

Low Clouds = Stratus

Up to 6,500 feet

Stratus
Stratocumulus
Nimbostratus

Clouds with Vertical Growth

Cumulus
Cumulonimbus

Special Clouds

Mammatus
Lenticular
Fog
Contrails

Cirrus Clouds
Cirrus clouds are the most common of the high clouds. They are composed of ice and are thin, wispy clouds blown in high winds into long streamers. Cirrus clouds are usually white and predict fair to pleasant weather. By watching the movement of cirrus clouds you can tell from which direction weather is approaching. When you see cirrus clouds, it usually indicates that a change in the weather will occur within 24 hours.

Cirrocumulus clouds appear as small, rounded white puffs that appear in long rows. The small ripples in the cirrocumulus clouds sometime resemble the scales of a fish. Cirrocumulus clouds are usually seen in the winter and indicate fair, but cold weather. In tropical regions, they may indicate an approaching hurricane.

"Alto" Clouds
Stratus clouds are uniform grayish clouds that often cover the entire sky. They resemble fog that doesn't reach the ground. Light mist or drizzle sometimes falls out of these clouds.

Cumulus clouds are white, puffy clouds that look like pieces of floating cotton. Cumulus clouds are often called "fair-weather clouds". The base of each cloud is flat and the top of each cloud has rounded towers. When the top of the cumulus clouds resemble the head of a cauliflower, it is called cumulus congestus or towering cumulus. These clouds grow upward and they can develop into giant cumulonimbus clouds, which are thunderstorm clouds.

Cumulonimbus clouds are thunderstorm clouds. High winds can flatten the top of the cloud into an anvil-like shape. Cumulonimbus clouds are associated with heavy rain, snow, hail, lightning and even tornadoes. The anvil usually points in the direction the storm is moving.
Cumulus Clouds Stratus Clouds
Mammatus clouds are low hanging bulges that droop from cumulonimbus clouds. Mammatus clouds are usually associated with severe weather. Altostratus clouds are gray or blue-gray mid level clouds composed of ice crystals and water droplets. The clouds usually cover the entire sky. In the thinner areas of the clouds, the sun may be dimly visible as a round disk. Altostratus clouds often form ahead of storms with continuous rain or snow.

Lenticular clouds are caused by a wave wind pattern created by the mountains. They look like discs or flying saucers that form near mountains.

Fog is a cloud on the ground. It is composed of billions of tiny water droplets floating in the air. Fog exists if the atmospheric visibility near the Earth's surface is reduced to 1 kilometer or less.

Contrails are condensation trails left behind jet aircrafts. Contrails form when hot humid air from jet exhaust mixes with environmental air of low vapor pressure and low temperature. The mixing is a result of turbulence generated by the engine exhaust. Special Clouds

Fractus clouds are small, ragged cloud fragments that are usually found under an ambient cloud base. They form or have broken off from a larger cloud, and are generally sheared by strong winds, giving them a jagged, shredded appearance. Fractus have irregular patterns, appearing much like torn pieces of cotton candy. They change constantly, often forming and dissipating rapidly. They do not have clearly defined bases. Sometimes they are persistent and form very near the surface.

Green Clouds are often associated with severe weather. The green color is not completely understood, but it is thought to have something to do with having a high amount of liquid water drops and hail inside the clouds. In the Great Plains region of the U.S. green clouds are associated with storms likely to produce hail and tornadoes.

Cloud Activities Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on clouds. In this activity, kids see clouds form when they breath on spoons. When warm, moist breath hits the cool spoon, water vapor condenses and turns into a cloud--or water you can see. Note: This is a PDF file, so you need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader.
Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on identifying clouds. In this activity, kids build a cloud finder and identify what clouds they see outside. Note: This is a PDF file, so you need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader.
Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan focusing on different types of clouds, how they are formed, and what they indicate about the weather. This activity is for grades 3-6. Note: This is a PDF file, so you need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader.
Cloud Experiment: Here is a great experiment that allows the kids to make a cloud in a bottle.

Fog Experiment: Here is a great experiment that allows the kids to make fog.
Pressure Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows how pressure is created in our atmosphere by sucking an egg in a bottle. This is a very cool experiment!
Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.
Make A Barometer Experiment: Here is an experiment that allows the kids to make a barometer.

Evaporation Experiment: Here is an experiment that shows kids how evaporation takes place.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Kids learn about tsunamis including what causes them such as earthquakes, where they occur, why they are dangerous, and what happens during a tsunami event.

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What is a drought?
A drought is when there is a lack of precipitation over an extended period of time, usually a season or more, resulting in a water shortage for some activity, group, or environmental sector. Its impacts result from the interplay between the natural event (less precipitation than expected) and the demand people place on water supply, and human activities can exacerbate the impacts of drought.

What causes a drought?
Drought has many causes. It can be caused by not receiving rain or snow over a period of time. If you live in a place where most of the water you use comes from a river, a drought in your area can be caused by places upstream from you not receiving enough moisture. There would be less water in the river for you and other people who live along the river to use. People can also play a big role in drought. If we use too much water during times of normal rainfall, we might not have enough water when a drought happens.

Can scientists predict if a drought is going to happen?
No! Studies conducted over the past century have shown that meteorological drought is never the result of a single cause. It is the result of many causes including, global weather patterns, high pressure, the tropical outlook and other global-scale variables.

Are there places in the United States that experience drought?
Yes! The Western United States is experiencing an exceptional and extreme drought at this time. To see the map, Click Here to see the current U.S. Drought Monitor.

What was the Dust Bowl?
Of all the droughts that have occurred in the United States, the drought events of the 1930s are widely considered to be the "drought of record" for the nation. The 1930s drought is often referred to as if it were one episode, but it was actually several distinct events occurring in such rapid succession that affected regions were not able to recover adequately before another drought began. The term Dust Bowl was coined in 1935 to describe the drought-affected south central United States in the aftermath of horrific dust storms. Although it technically refers to the western third of Kansas, southeastern Colorado, the Oklahoma Panhandle, the northern two-thirds of the Texas Panhandle, and northeastern New Mexico, the Dust Bowl has come to symbolize the hardships of the entire nation during the 1930s.

How bad was the drought in the Dust Bowl years?
In the 1930s, drought covered virtually the entire Plains for almost a decade. The drought's direct effect is most often remembered as agricultural. Many crops were damaged by deficient rainfall, high temperatures, and high winds, as well as insect infestations and dust storms that accompanied these conditions. The resulting agricultural depression contributed to the Great Depression's bank closures, business losses, increased unemployment, and other physical and emotional hardships. Although records focus on other problems, the lack of precipitation would also have affected wildlife and plant life, and would have created water shortages for domestic needs.

What was the Black Sunday Dust Storm?
The 1930s were times of tremendous hardship on the Great Plains. Settlers dealt not only with the Great Depression, but also with years of drought that plunged an already-suffering society into an onslaught of relentless dust storms for days and months on end. They were known as dirt storms, sand storms, black blizzards, and "dusters." It seemed as if it could get no worse, but on Sunday, the 14th of April 1935, it got worse. The day is known in history as "Black Sunday," when a mountain of blackness swept across the High Plains and instantly turned a warm, sunny afternoon into a horrible blackness that was darker than the darkest night. Famous songs were written about it, and on the following day, the world would hear the region referred to for the first time as "The Dust Bowl."

How does a drought affect our lives?
Drought affects our lives in many different ways because water is such an important part of so many of our activities. We need water to live, and animals and plants do too. We need water to grow the food we eat. We also use water for many different things in our lives, like washing dishes, cooking, bathing, and swimming or river rafting. Water is also used to help make the electricity we use to run the lights in our houses and the video games you may like to play. When we don't have enough water for these activities because of a drought, many people and many different things will be affected in many different ways.

How can we help if we're in a drought?
One of the easiest steps we can take to help mitigate the impacts of drought is conserving water. If we use water wisely at all times, more water will be available to us and to plants and wildlife when a drought happens. We can lose a lot of water doing simple everyday tasks. Did you know that turning off the water while you brush your teeth can save more than 100 gallons of water a month? If you have a leaky faucet, the drips can add up to 300 gallons of wasted water a month.

What are the different types of drought?
There are four basic approaches to measuring drought: meteorological, hydrological, agricultural, and socioeconomic. The first three approaches deal with ways to measure drought as a physical phenomenon. The last deals with drought in terms of supply and demand, tracking the effects of water shortfall as it ripples through socioeconomic systems.

Meteorological drought is defined usually on the basis of the degree of dryness (in comparison to some "normal" or average amount) and the duration of the dry period. Definitions of meteorological drought must be considered as region specific since the atmospheric conditions that result in deficiencies of precipitation are highly variable from region to region. For example, some definitions of meteorological drought identify periods of drought on the basis of the number of days with precipitation less than some specified threshold. This measure is only appropriate for regions characterized by a year-round precipitation regime such as a tropical rainforest, humid subtropical climate, or humid mid-latitude climate.

Agricultural drought links various characteristics of meteorological (or hydrological) drought to agricultural impacts, focusing on precipitation shortages, differences between actual and potential evapotranspiration, soil water deficits, reduced groundwater or reservoir levels, and so forth. Plant water demand depends on prevailing weather conditions, biological characteristics of the specific plant, its stage of growth, and the physical and biological properties of the soil. A good definition of agricultural drought should be able to account for the variable susceptibility of crops during different stages of crop development, from emergence to maturity.

Hydrological drought is associated with the effects of periods of precipitation (including snowfall) shortfalls on surface or subsurface water supply (i.e., streamflow, reservoir and lake levels, groundwater). The frequency and severity of hydrological drought is often defined on a watershed or river basin scale. Although all droughts originate with a deficiency of precipitation, hydrologists are more concerned with how this deficiency plays out through the hydrologic system. Hydrological droughts are usually out of phase with or lag the occurrence of meteorological and agricultural droughts. It takes longer for precipitation deficiencies to show up in components of the hydrological system such as soil moisture, streamflow, and groundwater and reservoir levels. As a result, these impacts are out of phase with impacts in other economic sectors.

Socioeconomic definitions of drought associate the supply and demand of some economic good with elements of meteorological, hydrological, and agricultural drought. It differs from the aforementioned types of drought because its occurrence depends on the time and space processes of supply and demand to identify or classify droughts. The supply of many economic goods, such as water, forage, food grains, fish, and hydroelectric power, depends on weather. Because of the natural variability of climate, water supply is ample in some years but unable to meet human and environmental needs in other years. Socioeconomic drought occurs when the demand for an economic good exceeds supply as a result of a weather-related shortfall in water supply.

Aquifer - an area that contains large amounts of water under the surface of the earth.

Climate - day-to-day weather over a longer period of time. Climatology is the study of climate.

Climograph - a graph that shows monthly average temperature and precipitation for some location.

Dam - a structure built across a river to hold back water for a variety of reasons, including protecting areas from floods, storing water, and generating power.

Desalination - the process of removing salts and other minerals from seawater so that it can be used for drinking water.

Drought - less rainfall than is expected over an extended period of time, usually several months or longer. Or, more formally, it is a deficiency of rainfall over a period of time, resulting in a water shortage for some activity, group, or environmental sector.

Drought Index - a numerical scale that scientists use to describe the severity of a drought. Scientists take many kinds of data (like streamflow, rainfall, temperature, and snowpack) and "blend" it into a single number, called a drought index value, to make it easier to understand the drought conditions of a particular area. Drought indices are one type of drought indicator.

Drought I ndicator - a way to look at one or more variables, such as precipitation, to describe available water in soil or hydrologic systems. It may be a record of a single measurement, such as rainfall at a particular rain gauge. It may also be a complex index. Drought indices (indexes) are a subset of drought indicators.

Dust Bowl - an area of the U.S. Plains that included parts of Kansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico. The term was coined in the 1930s, when dry weather and high winds caused many dust storms throughout the United States, but particularly in this area.

Erosion - a process that wears the earth's surface away, causing soil to move from one place to another. It's a natural process, but human activities can make it worse.

Groundwater - water that is found underground in spaces in soil, sand, or rocks.

Hydroelectricity - electricity created by channeling water through turbines in power stations located below dams.

Irrigation - an agricultural practice that involves providing water to crops through pipes, ditches, or streams.

Mitigation - actions that we can take before, or at the beginning of, drought to help reduce the impacts of drought. Mitigation includes actions as diverse as drought planning, implementing land use practices that increase the organic content and water-holding capacity of soil, and designing agricultural policy that doesn't encourage short-term economic gains at the expense of long-term productive capacity. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change uses mitigation to mean reducing emissions of greenhouse gasses.

Reservoirs - water that's collected and stored in natural or manmade lakes.

Submarginal Farmland - lands with nutrient-poor soils and/or soils that have been damaged by poor cultivation practices.

Water Banking - a water management strategy that temporarily transfers water from those who are willing to lease it to those who are willing to pay to use it.

Water Recycling - reusing treated wastewater for purposes like agricultural and landscape irrigation. It's also referred to as water reclamation or water reuse.

Xeriscaping - a type of landscaping around homes and businesses that uses a limited amount of water.

Click on the chart to make larger!

Click Here to see the current U.S. Drought Monitor!

Lesson Plan: Here is a lesson plan on water conservation.

Lesson Plan: Here is a lesson plan on how drought affect agriculture.

Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.

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What is a drought? A drought is when there is a lack of precipitation over an extended period of time, usually a season or more, resulting in a water shortage for some activity, group, or environmental sector.

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Volcanoes
(Volcanoes are not associated with weather, but instead are natural disasters.)

What is a volcano?
A volcano is a mountain that opens downward to a pool of molten rock below the surface of the earth. When pressure builds up, eruptions occur. Gases and rock shoot up through the opening and spill over or fill the air with lava fragments. Eruptions can cause lateral blasts, lava flows, hot ash flows, mudslides, avalanches, falling ash and floods. Volcano eruptions have been known to knock down entire forests. An erupting volcano can trigger tsunamis, flash floods, earthquakes, mudflows and rockfalls.

How are volcanoes formed?
Volcanoes are formed when magma from within the Earth's upper mantle works its way to the surface. At the surface, it erupts to form lava flows and ash deposits. Over time as the volcano continues to erupt, it will get bigger and bigger.

What are the different stages of volcanoes?
Scientists have categorized volcanoes into three main categories: active, dormant, and extinct. An active volcano is one which has recently erupted and there is a possibility that it may erupt soon. A dormant volcano is one which has not erupted in a long time but there is a possibility it can erupt in the future. An extinct volcano is one which has erupted thousands of years ago and there's no possibility of eruption.

Why do volcanoes erupt? The Earth's crust is made up of huge slabs called plates, which fit together like a jigsaw puzzle. These plates sometimes move. The friction causes earthquakes and volcanic eruptions near the edges of the plates. The theory that explains this process is called plate tectonics.

The theory of plate tectonics is a interesting story of continents drifting from place to place breaking apart, colliding, and grinding against each other. The plate tectonic theory is supported by a wide range of evidence that considers the earth's crust and upper mantle to be composed of several large, thin, relatively rigid plates that move relative to one another. The plates are all moving in different directions and at different speeds. Sometimes the plates crash together, pull apart or sideswipe each other. When this happens, it commonly results in earthquakes. What are plate tectonics?

Continental Drift: To see this animation again, just refresh this page! This animation shows you what our planet looked like millions of years ago and what it looks like now! (Graphic Credit: Geology Department at University of California, Berkeley)

There are more than 1500 active volcanoes on the Earth. We currently know of 80 or more which are under the oceans. Active volcanoes in the U.S. are found mainly in Hawaii, Alaska, California, Oregon and Washington.
How many volcanoes are there?

What are the different types of volcanoes?
Volcanoes are grouped into four types: cinder cones, composite volcanoes, shield volcanoes and lava volcanoes.

Cinder Cones

Cinder cones are circular or oval cones made up of small fragments of lava from a single vent that have been blown into the air, cooled and fallen around the vent.

Composite Volcanoes

Composite volcanoes are steep-sided volcanoes composed of many layers of volcanic rocks, usually made from high-viscosity lava, ash and rock debris. Mt. Rainier and Mount St. Helens are examples of this type of volcano.

Shield Volcanoes

Shield volcanoes are volcanoes shaped like a bowl or shield in the middle with long gentle slopes made by basaltic lava flows. Basalt lava flows from these volcanoes are called flood basalts. The volcanoes that formed the basalt of the Columbia Plateau were shield volcanoes.

Lava Volcanoes

Lava domes are formed when erupting lava is too thick to flow and makes a steep-sided mound as the lava piles up near the volcanic vent. The eruption of Mount St. Helens in 1980 was caused in part by a lava dome shifting to allow explosive gas and steam to escape from inside the mountain.

Magma is liquid rock inside a volcano. Lava is liquid rock (magma) that flows out of a volcano. Fresh lava glows red hot to white hot as it flows.

What is the difference between lava and magma?

Why does lava take a long time to cool down?
Lava cools slowly because lava is a poor conductor of heat. Lava flows slow down and thicken as they harden.
What is a pyroclastic flow?
A pyroclastic flow is a fluidized mixture of solid to semi-solid fragments and hot, expanding gases that flows down the sides of a volcano. These awesome features are heavier-than-air emulsions that move much like a snow avalanche, except that they are fiercely hot, contain toxic gases, and move at phenomenal, hurricane-force speeds. They are the most deadly of all volcanic phenomena.

What is lahar?
A lahar is a type of mudflow or debris flow composed of pyroclastic material, rocky debris, and water. The material flows down from a volcano, typically along a river valley. It is very dangerous because it's consistency and the way it acts is very much like cement. It is liquid when it's moving, but when it stops, it solidifies. This can cause just as much devastation as lava itself.
What is pumice?
Pumice is a light, porous volcanic rock that forms during explosive eruptions. It resembles a sponge because it consists of a network of gas bubbles frozen amidst fragile volcanic glass and minerals. All types of magma (basalt, andesite, dacite, and rhyolite) will form pumice.

What is the largest active volcano?
The world's largest, active volcano is Mauna Loa in Hawaii, where famous coffee is grown in the rich volcanic soils. Mauna Loa is 13,677 feet above sea level. From its base below sea level to its summit, Mauna Loa is taller than Mount Everest.

What is the Ring of Fire?

The Pacific Ring of Fire is an area of frequent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions encircling the basin of the Pacific Ocean. The Ring of Fire has 452 volcanoes and is home to over 50% of the world's active and dormant volcanoes. Ninety percent of the world's earthquakes and 81% of the world's largest earthquakes occur along the Ring of Fire.

When did Mount St. Helens erupt?
On May 18, 1980, Mount St. Helens erupted. It's located in southwestern Washington State in the Cascade Range. The blast was heard as far away as Montana, Idaho, Canada and California. Fifty-seven people died and the eruption caused $1.2 billion in damage.

What are some other notable volcano eruptions?
Krakatoa was a dormant volcano in Indonesia, which awakened and produced one of the biggest volcanic eruptions in 1883. So massive was the eruption that the sound of it was heard as far away as Australia. It's widely reported as the loudest sound heard in recorded history. The Krakatoa eruption created a huge amount of ash cloud which covered the Earth and reduced global temperatures for 5 years! A total of 40,000 people died in that explosion and an entire chain of the volcanic island was destroyed. For more info: Click Here!

Mount Pelee was a dormant volcano situated in the Caribbean island of Martinique. In 1902, it erupted in a massive horizontal explosion sending huge clouds of ash released towards the nearby town of Saint-Pierre. The side of the volcano exploded and lava flowed straight into the town, killing 30,000 people in a matter of minutes. It is regarded as one of the biggest and most devastating volcanic eruptions of the 20th century, a benchmark for future eruptions.

Mount Fujiyama, also popularly known as Mount Fuji, is an active volcano which last erupted in 1708. It is incidentally the tallest mountain in Japan. If you are visiting Tokyo, the capital of Japan, look in the west on a clear day and you will be able to see Mount Fuji. It is an iconic volcano. Mount Fuji is 3,776 meters high and it is snow clad throughout the year, with five lakes surrounding it. Currently in a state of dormancy, there has not been any eruption reported for more than 300 years. The last known eruption lasted for about 3 weeks during which it covered the surrounding villages with ash and cinders. Mount Fuji is now a popular tourist location with a large number of climbers actively scaling the mountain top.

What is a tsunami?
A tsunami is a large ocean wave usually caused by an underwater earthquake or a volcanic explosion. Tsunamis are NOT tidal waves. Tidal waves are caused by the forces of the moon, sun, and planets upon the tides, as well as the wind as it moves over the water. With typical waves, water flows in circles, but with a tsunami, water flows straight. This is why tsunamis cause so much damage!

Know the Lingo
MAGMA - Magma is the liquid rock inside a volcano.

LAVA - Lava is the liquid rock (magma) that flows out of a volcano. Lava glows red hot to white hot as it flows.

ACTIVE VOLCANO - An active volcano is one that erupts regularly.
Volcano Safety Tips
PLAN FOR A VOLCANO: First of all, have a disaster plan and know whether or not you are at risk for danger. Be prepared for mudslides, flash floods, earthquakes, ash falling, acid rain and tsunamis. Prepare a disaster supplies kit for your home and car. Include a first aid kit, canned food and a can opener, bottled water, battery-operated radio, flashlight, protective clothing, dust mask, goggles and sturdy shoes. Don't forget, know all of your evacuation routes. DURING A VOLCANO: Follow the evacuation order issued by authorities. Avoid areas downwind and river valleys downstream of the volcano. If your caught indoors, close all windows and doors, put machinery inside a barn, and bring animals inside. If you're trapped outdoors, seek shelter indoors. If you're caught in falling rocks, roll into a ball and protect your head. If you're caught near a stream, be aware of mudflows and move to higher ground. Protect yourself when ash falls by wearing long-sleeved shirts and long pants. Use goggles to protect your eyes. Wear a dust mask and keep car engines off.
DORMANT VOLCANO - A dormant volcano is one that has not erupted for many years, although there is still some activity deep inside. AFTER A VOLCANO: Cover you mouth and nose. Volcanic ash can irritate your respiratory system. Wear goggles and protect your eyes. Keep your skin covered. Clear roofs of ash, because the ash is very heavy and can cause the building to collapse.
Volcano Activities
Lesson Plan: Here are great lesson plans on learning more about volcanoes. These are great lesson plans for elementary school students.
EXTINCT VOLCANO - An extinct volcano is a volcano that is no longer active.Volcano Experiment: Here is an experiment on how to make a soda bottle volcano with Mentos.
Volcano Experiment: Here is another experiment on how to make a baking soda volcano.
GEYSERS - Geysers are springs that throw boiling water high in the air. They are caused by volcanic heat warming trapped ground water.Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.

ASH - Ash are very small fragments of lava or rock blasted into the air by volcanic explosions.

PUMICE - It is a light-colored volcanic rock containing lots of bubbles from trapped gases.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Kids learn more about the science of dangerous weather. Tornadoes, hurricanes, and thunderstorms.

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Wildfires

What is a wildfire?
A wildfire also known as a wildland fire, forest fire, vegetation fire, grass fire, peat fire, bushfire (in Australia), or hill fire is an uncontrolled fire often occurring in wildland areas, but which can also consume houses or agricultural resources. Wildfires often begin unnoticed, but they spread quickly igniting brush, trees and homes.

What causes a wildfire?

Common causes of wildfires include lightning, human carelessness, arson, volcano eruption, and pyroclastic cloud from active volcano. Heat waves, droughts, and cyclical climate changes such as El Niño can also have a dramatic effect on the risk of wildfires. Although, more than four out of every five wildfires are caused by people.

Where can wildfires occur?
Wildfires can occur anywhere, but are common in the forested areas of the United States and Canada. They are also susceptible in many places around the world, including much of the vegetated areas of Australia as well as in the Western Cape of South Africa. The climates are sufficiently moist to allow the growth of trees, but feature extended dry, hot periods. Fires are particularly prevalent in the summer and fall, and during droughts when fallen branches, leaves, and other material can dry out and become highly flammable. Wildfires are also common in grasslands and scrublands.
What are the Santa Ana winds?

The Santa Ana winds are hot, dry winds that aggravate the fire danger in forests and bush lands. These winds characteristically appear in Southern California and Northern Baja California weather during autumn and early winter. In southern California, under the influence of Santa Ana winds, wildfires can move at tremendous speeds, up to 40 miles in a single day, consuming up to 1,000 acres per hour. Dense clouds of burning embers push ahead of the flames crossing firebreaks without a problem.

What is a fire tornado?

A fire tornado or fire whirl is just a tornado made of fire. It happens when certain conditions (depending on air temperature and currents), acquires a vertical vorticity and forms a whirl, or a tornado-like effect. Fire tornadoes may be whirlwinds separated from the flames, either within the burn area or outside it. A fire tornado can make fires more dangerous.

How do firefighters put out the wildfires?
Firefighters use a tool known as a pulaski. Its a combination of an ax and hoe used to dig a fireline. A fireline is a strip of land from which all brush and debris have been cleared to rob a wildfire of its fuel. Firefighters also use hotshots and smoke jumpers to clear a large path in a big circle around the fire so the blaze is contained in a ring of dirt. When the fire reaches this area, it runs out of fuel and starves to death. If the fire is too large, however, planes and helicopters fly overhead, dropping water and special chemicals that smother the flames. This pink, fire-retardant chemical is called sky jell-o.

Click Here to get the latest wildfire information.

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Know the Lingo

SURFACE FIRES - The most common type of wildfires, surface fires move slowly and burn along the forest floor, killing and damaging vegetation.

GROUND FIRES - These are usually started by lightning, ground fires burn on or below the forest floor through the root system.

CROWN FIRES - These fires spread by wind moving quickly along the tops of trees.

SANTA ANA WINDS - "Santa Ana" is the name given to the gusty northeast or east wind that occurs in Southern California during the fall and winter months. Santa Ana winds are often hot and very dry, greatly aggravating the fire danger in forests and bush lands.

CONFLAGRATION - A large and destructive fire, typically aggravated by strong winds that carry firebrands over natural or artificial barriers.

Click Here to learn about more wildfire facts!

Wildfire Safety Tips
BEFORE A WILDFIRE: Have a disaster plan. Know whether you're in a wildfire prone area. Plant fire resistant shrubs and trees around your home. Have a garden hose that is long enough to reach around your home. Prepare a disaster supplies kit for your home and car. Include a first aid kit, canned food and a can opener, bottled water, battery-operated radio, flashlight, protective clothing and written instructions on how to turn off electricity, gas, and water. Always listen to the radio and television for the latest information and instructions for your area.
DURING A WILDFIRE: If you're advised to evacuate then do so immediately. Wear protective clothing and lock your home. Tell someone you left and where you are going. Choose a safe route away from fire hazards. Watch for changes in the speed and direction of fire and smoke.

AFTER A WILDFIRE: Stay away from wildfire areas until it is safe.
Wildfire Activities
Lesson Plan: Here is a great lesson plan on teaching students to have an escape plan if a fire threatens their home.

Science Fair Project Ideas: Here is a complete list of science fair project ideas. Discover the science behind the weather that impacts us every day.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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Weather Instruments

A THERMOMETER measures the air temperature. Most thermometers are closed glass tubes containing liquids such as alcohol or mercury. When air around the tube heats the liquid, the liquid expands and moves up the tube. A scale then shows what the actual temperature is.

A BAROMETER measures air pressure. It tells you whether or not the pressure is rising or falling. A rising barometer means sunny and dry conditions, while a falling barometer means stormy and wet conditions. An Italian scientist named Torricelli built the first barometer in 1643.

A SLING PSYCHROMETER measures relative humidity, using the cooling effect of evaporation. Two thermometers are used in a sling psychrometer. Wet the cloth of one of the thermometers and swing the psychrometer around a few times. Water evaporates from the cloth, causing the temperatures on that thermometer to be lower the the other.

A RAIN GAUGE measures the amount of rain that has fallen over a specific time period.

A WIND VANE is an instrument that determines the direction from which the wind is blowing.

An ANEMOMETER measures wind speed. The cups catch the wind, turning a dial attached to the instrument. The dial shows the wind speed.

WEATHER MAPS indicate atmospheric conditions above a large portion of the Earth's surface. Meteorologists use weather maps to forecast the weather.
A HYGROMETER measures the water vapor content of air or the humidity.

A WEATHER BALLOON measures weather conditions higher up in the atmosphere.

A COMPASS is a navigational instrument for finding directions.

WEATHER SATELLITES are used to photograph and track large-scale air movements. Then meteorologists compile and analyze the data with the help of computers. YOUR EYES are one of the the best ways to help detect the weather. Always keep an eye at the sky and you'll usually be on top of weather conditions.

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Weather Wiz Kids weather information for kids

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Weather Wiz Kids is a fun and safe website for kids about all the weather info they need to know. It contains tools for weather education, including weather games, activities, experiments, photos, a glossary and educational teaching materials for the classroom.

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We see clouds nearly everyday. They float in the sky above us and block out the Sun. Sometimes clouds are white and puffy. Sometimes they are dark and cover the entire sky. Different kinds of clouds can mean different kinds of weather. Meteorologists study the formation and make up of clouds to understand the weather better.

What are clouds made of?

Clouds are made up of tiny droplets or frozen crystals of water.

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Kids learn about clouds including how they form, levels, fun facts, and types of clouds such as cirrus, cumulus, and stratus.

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The 10 deadliest US tornadoes on record | CNN

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Tornadoes are capable of tremendous destruction and can have devastating consequences. They are most common in the Central Plains and southeastern US, but they have been reported in all 50 states, according to the National Weather Service. Tornadoes kill an average of 60 people a year in the United States, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

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They can speed across the ocean as fast as a jet plane, swallow up islands and wipe out villages.

But what causes tsuamis...? Join National Geographic Kids and dive into our tsunami facts to find out!

What causes a tsunami?

Meaning " great harbour wave" in Japanese, tsunamis are sometimes called "tidal waves" but their strength has nothing to do with the tides. About four out of five tsunamis happen within the Ring Of Fire, a zone in the Pacific Ocean where earthquakes and volcanic eruptions frequently take place.

Giant slabs of the Earth's crust, called tectonic plates, grind together. Sometimes, though, the plates get stuck, the pressure builds up and they suddenly slam into a new position. This causes an earthquake. If an earthquake lifts or drops part of the ocean floor, the water above rises and starts spreading across the ocean, causing a tsunami. Underwater landslides or volcanic eruptions can also displace water (cause water to spread across the ocean) and may lead to a tsunami.

How big is a tsunami?

Out in the open ocean, tsunami waves are only about one-metre high because the water is deep. However, as the water becomes shallow, the waves slow down and begin to grow. They can rise 35m or higher - that's the same as a 10-floor block of flats! However, the scariest thing about a tsunami is its wavelength, as this determines how far inland it can travel. Whereas a large wave caused by a storm might have a wavelength of up to 150m, a tsunami could reach up to a fearsome 1,000km!

How fast is a tsunami?

A normal wind wave travels at about 90kmh, but a tsunami can race across the ocean at an incredible 970kmh! Sometimes, before a tsunami hits, there is a huge vacuum effect, sucking water from harbours and beaches. People can see the ocean floor littered with flopping fish and other sea animals. Then a wave blasts onto the shore minutes later, then another and another for two hours or more. There may also be up to one hour between each wave.

Can you predict when a tsunami is coming?

To save lives, scientists established the Pacific Tsunami Warning System, based in Hawaii, in the USA. Its network of detectors can track quakes that may cause a tsunami. These waves can race from one side of the Pacific Ocean to the other in less than a day, so people need to be warned in time to head for higher ground!

What do you think of these tsunami facts? Let us know by leaving a comment, below!

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Tsunami facts: check out the mighty wave! - National Geographic Kids

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Check out these epic tsunami facts from National Geographic Kids! How do tsunamis form? And how big are they? Find out all about them in our tsunami facts...

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Kids learn about the science of volcanoes including how they form mountains, lava, and magma; types such as cinder cone, composite, and shield; watch a video about volcanoes.

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Forest fires are large uncontrolled fires that take place in the forest. Some of the fiercest fires occur in the forest because there is so much fuel (trees) to burn. Forest fires are a type of wildfire. Other types of wildfires include grass fires, brush fires, and hill fires.

Major Causes of Forest Fires

The major cause of forest fires in the United States is human activities. This can be carelessness such as not putting out a campfire or dropping a lit cigarette. It may also be arson, which is setting a fire on purpose and is against the law. Around 80% of forest fires in the United States are caused by humans.

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Kids learn about forest fires including major human and natural causes, how they spread, firefighters, campfire safety, fun facts, and good wildfires.

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Kids learn about weather forcasting and meteorology including cold and warm fronts, high and low pressure systems, fun facts, and technology.

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Tornadoes are one of the most violent and powerful types of weather. They consist of a very fast rotating column of air that usually forms a funnel shape. They can be very dangerous as their high speed winds can break apart buildings, knock down trees, and even toss cars into the air.

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Kids learn about tornadoes including how they form, characteristics, types including supercell and waterspout, categories, and fun facts.

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Enjoy our awesome range of Earth facts for kids. Check out the cool trivia and have fun learning about some of our planet's most amazing features.

Tsunami Facts

Check out our tsunami facts for kids and learn some interesting information related to these great walls of water that can cause so much destruction. Find out what causes tsunamis and read about some notable recent examples of tsunamis that have occurred around the globe.

Tsunamis are huge waves of water that are usually caused by earthquakes or volcanic eruptions.

As a tsunami approaches the shore, water may recede from the coast, if it is shallow enough the water may be pulled back hundreds of metres. If you are in the area, observing this is a good indication that a tsunami is on the way.

Regions in tsunami danger zones often have warning systems in place to give people as much time to evacuate as possible.

When tsunamis hit shallow water (often near the coast) they slow down but increase in height.

An earthquake in the Indian Ocean off Indonesia in December 2004 caused a tsunami that killed over 200000 people in 14 countries. More earthquake facts.

In March 2011, the Tohoku earthquake off the eastern coast of Japan caused a tsunami that was a major factor in the death of over 15000 people.

The tsunami waves created by the Tohoku earthquake reached heights of over 40 metres (131 feet) in some areas, wiping out coastal towns and causing a number of nuclear accidents.

The Japanese word tsunami literally means 'harbor wave'.

Tsunamis are sometimes referred to as tidal waves but this term has fallen out of favour because tsunamis are not related to tides.

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Tsunami Facts for Kids - Interesting Information about Tsunamis

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Enjoy our awesome range of Earth facts for kids. Check out the cool trivia and have fun learning about some of our planet's most amazing features. Tsunami Facts Check out our tsunami facts for kids and learn some interesting information related to these great walls of water that can cause so much destruction.

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Look at the causes and effects of the droughts that have plagued the western United States for years. Understand the conditions that have led to increased numbers of forest fires year round and learn how the heat from these firestorms creates its own weather system, forming giant cloud structures called pyrocumulus.

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There is a ritual of sorts that goes on in Florida every year when folks get wind of the news that a big storm is a-brewing. Windows are boarded, boats are dry-docked and grocery stores and home improvement stores are picked clean of anything that might come in handy in the unlikely event that a massive hurricane hits.

What keeps people going through the annual routine of following spaghetti models and prepping for the big one in the Sunshine State and other coastal areas is that many have seen a hurricane or two, and they know the kind of serious destruction these storms can cause. From an 18th-century hurricane that ravaged the Caribbean to the devastating blow issued by Sandy in 2012, history is replete with stories of the wreckage and ruin that come with a major storm.

By definition, a hurricane is a tropical storm with winds above 74 miles per hour (119 kilometers per hour). The systems occur all over the world. In the Western Atlantic and Eastern Pacific Oceans, they are called hurricanes. In the Indian Ocean and South Pacific, they are called cyclones and in the Western Pacific, they are called typhoons.

The following hurricanes aren't necessarily the deadliest of all time, or the costliest. But they all sit at the intersection of property damage, powerful winds and human tragedy, and all captured the world's attention for differing reasons. We've listed them in order of lives lost.

Hurricane Michael decimated the Florida Panhandle, particularly in the Panama City Beach, Mexico Beach and Cape San Blas, when it made landfall Oct. 10, 2018 as a Category 5. It was the strongest hurricane ever to hit that area and only the second Category 5 to make landfall on the Gulf Coast. Michael also was the first Category 5 storm to hit the U.S. since Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

Hurricane Michael started as a typical weak October Caribbean tropical system. However, once the system moved over warm Gulf of Mexico waters, it rapidly intensified and became a major hurricane with sustained winds of 161 miles per hour (259 kilometers per hour). The catastrophic damage was caused from wind and storm surge, and spread inland into southwest Georgia.

Michael caused 16 deaths in four states, including Florida, Virginia, North Carolina and Georgia. Damage estimates from the Insurance Information Institute from Michael total between $9 and $12 billion.

After traveling through the Gulf of Mexico in late August 2017, Hurricane Harvey arrived in the United States as a Category 4 storm. At the time it was the first major hurricane to make landfall in the continental United States in a decade, after 2005's Hurricane Wilma. The arrival of Harvey coincided with its peak intensity: winds of 130 miles per hour (215 kilometers per hour). Coastal communities in Texas like Corpus Christi and Galveston were hard-hit, but the most striking damage was in Houston, the fourth-largest city in the country.

Flooding in Houston was severe, as Harvey remained over the area for days, dumping up to 50 inches (127 centimeters) of water in certain locations. That's the same amount of rainfall Houston usually sees in an entire year, all deposited in a four-day span, and the area's ecosystem and manmade environment were both overwhelmed. The storm also affected communities like Beaumont, Texas, where the entire city was cut off from fresh drinking water. Then-FEMA director Brock Long called Harvey " probably the worst disaster the state's seen."

More than 13,000 people required rescuing throughout Texas, and an overall 30,000 people from that state were displaced by floodwaters. And while Texas was hardest-hit, the storm also affected communities in Louisiana, Alabama, Tennessee and beyond. Damage estimates were around $121 billion, making it the fourth-most expensive hurricane in U.S. history.

Harvey claimed at least 82 lives in Texas. Officials say that number includes those who died as a direct result of the storm, drowning in flash floods or on roads.

When Hurricane Camille hit in August 1969, it was a nasty storm that brought heavy flooding and 200-mile per hour (320-kilometer per hour) winds to the Gulf Coast and later Virginia. It also was one of only two Category 5 hurricanes to hit the Continental U.S. since 1900. (Since then two others have made landfall: Andrew in 1992 and Michael in 2018.) After forming near the Cayman Islands in August 1969, Camille first blew through Cuba as a Category 3 but intensified in the Gulf of Mexico making a beeline for Mississippi where it made landfall between Bay St. Louis and Pass Christian Aug. 18. Exact wind speed at landfall is unknown, as weather instruments were destroyed, though estimates put suggest gusts were as high as 200 miles per hour (322 kilometers per hour). However, with 900 mb pressure at landfall, Camille still ranks as the second most intense hurricane to hit the continental U.S.

Winds as high as 100 miles per hour were clocked across much of Southern Mississippi, leading to wind damage far inland. A 24-foot (7-meter) storm surge also contributed to major devastation in Mississippi. Camille eventually weakened to a tropical storm as it moved up the East Coast and reached Virginia, but the storm continued to dump upward of 20 inches (51 centimeters) of rain on the region, contributing to flash flooding and mudslides just 120 miles (193 kilometers) from the nation's capital. The storm resulted in 256 deaths and more than $1.4 billion in damage.

Camille played an important role in hurricane tracking in that it spawned the creation of the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale, which ranks storms from categories 1 to 5 based on wind speed. Category 1 hurricanes blow winds ranging from 74 to 95 miles (119 to 153 kilometers), while those in the Category 5 range feature wind speeds of more than 156 miles (251 kilometers) an hour. The system is designed to give residents in danger zones a better idea of what to expect from a brewing storm.

Hurricane Katrina is often referred to as a man-made, rather than natural, disaster by those who fault infrastructure problems for the decimation caused by this storm that ravaged New Orleans and other parts of the Gulf Coast.

On Aug. 26, 2005, Hurricane Katrina looked like a hurricane that was fizzling out, but it began rapidly strengthening to Category 5 levels over warm water in the Gulf of Mexico. By Aug. 28, a mandatory evacuation order was issued for New Orleans. As the Category 3 hurricane reached the city, water topped over its systems of levees causing them to break and the streets to flood. Eventually, 80 percent of New Orleans was underwater.

Katrina left residents who couldn't - or chose not to - evacuate stranded in their homes with waters rising around them. Forty percent of hurricane-related deaths were from drowning. Slow federal government reaction to the plight of those affected led to claims of incompetence and even deliberate disregard for poor and Black people.

In all, Hurricane Katrina claimed 1,833 lives and at $161 billion is considered the costliest hurricane in U.S. history. The Federal Emergency Management Agency called it "the single most catastrophic natural disaster in U.S. history."

Hurricane Katrina also displaced 400,000 people to areas like Houston and Atlanta. Many never returned. An upgraded system of levees was completed in 2013, but officials are worried about the massive cost of maintaining them with a shrunken tax base.

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The Americas have been hit with some major hurricanes throughout the decades. But which were the worst ones in history?

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Science >> Earth Science for Kids

Weather - Hurricanes (Tropical Cyclones)

What is a hurricane?

A hurricane is a large rotating storm with high speed winds that forms over warm waters in tropical areas. Hurricanes have sustained winds of at least 74 miles per hour and an area of low air pressure in the center called the eye.

Different Names for Hurricanes

The scientific name for a hurricane is a tropical cyclone. Tropical cyclones go by different names in different places. In North America and the Caribbean they are called "hurricanes", in the Indian Ocean they are called "cyclones", and in Southeast Asia they are called "typhoons."

How do hurricanes form?

Hurricanes form over the warm ocean water of the tropics. When warm moist air over the water rises, it is replaced by cooler air. The cooler air will then warm and start to rise. This cycle causes huge storm clouds to form. These storm clouds will begin to rotate with the spin of the Earth forming an organized system. If there is enough warm water, the cycle will continue and the storm clouds and wind speeds will grow causing a hurricane to form.

Parts of a Hurricane

Eye - At the center of the hurricane is the eye. The eye is an area of very low air pressure. There are generally no clouds in the eye and the wind is calm. Don't let this fool you, however, the most dangerous part of the storm is at the edge of the eye called the eye wall.

Eye wall - Around the outside of the eye is a wall made up of very heavy clouds. This is the most dangerous part of the hurricane and where the highest speed winds are. The winds at the eye wall can reach speeds of 155 miles per hour.

Rainbands - Hurricanes have large spirally bands of rain called rainbands. These bands can drop huge amounts of rainfall causing flooding when the hurricane hits land.

Diameter - Hurricanes can become huge storms. The diameter of the hurricane is measured from one side to the other. Hurricanes can span a diameter of over 600 miles.

Height - The storm clouds that power hurricanes can become very tall. A powerful hurricane can reach nine miles into the atmosphere.

The structure of a hurricane

Where do tropical cyclones occur?

Tropical cyclones occur over the ocean in areas near the equator. This is because there is plenty of warm water in these areas to allow the storms to form. There are seven major areas in the world that tend to produce tropical cyclones. See the map below.

Locations of tropical cyclones throughout the world

When do hurricanes occur?

Hurricanes that form in the Caribbean and the Atlantic Ocean occur between June 1st and November 30th each year. This is called hurricane season.

Why are hurricanes dangerous?

When hurricanes strike land they can cause huge amounts of damage. Most of the damage is caused by flooding and storm surge. Storm surge is when the ocean level rises at the coastline due to the power of the storm. Hurricanes also cause damage with high speed winds that can blow downtrees and damage homes. Many hurricanes can develop several small tornados as well.

How are they named?

Hurricanes in the Atlantic are named based on a list of names maintained by the World Meteorological Organization. The names go in alphabetical order and the storms are named as they appear. So the first storm of the year will always have a name that starts with the letter "A." There are six lists of names and each year a new list is used.

Categories

Tropical cyclones are categorized according to the speed of sustained winds.

Tropical Depression - 38 mph or less

Tropical Storm - 39 to 73 mph

Hurricane

Category 1 - 74 to 95 mph

Category 2 - 96 to 110 mph

Category 3 - 111 to 129 mph

Category 4 - 130 to 156 mph

Category 5 - 157 or higher mph

Interesting Facts about Hurricanes

Hurricanes rotate counterclockwise in the northern hemisphere and clockwise in the southern hemisphere. This is due to the rotation of the Earth called the Coriolis effect.

The letters Q, U, X, Y, and Z are not used for the first letter when naming hurricanes.

The names are alternated between boy and girl names.

Weather forecasters draw a cone showing where they think the hurricane is most likely to travel.

You can always find out the latest information on hurricanes at the website of the National Hurricane Center which tracks and forecasts hurricanes.

Activities

Take a ten question quiz about this page.

Listen to a recorded reading of this page:

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Earth Science Subjects

Science >> Earth Science for Kids

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Kids learn about hurricanes (Tropical Cyclones) including how they form, names, eye, eye wall, rainbands, locations, seasons, facts, and categories.

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Explore Scholastic Teaching Tools for teaching resources, printables, book lists, and more. Enhance your classroom experience with expert advice!

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Easy Science  for Kids: All About Earthquakes

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Easy Science  for Kids: All About Earthquakes

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The ground shakes, buildings tumble and the earth heaves and cracks. Serious earthquakes are terrifying and dangerous, but are rare in the U.S. But why do earthquakes happen? The earth is made up of four layers - the inner core, outer core, mantle and crust. The mantle and crust are a thin skin compared to the other layers.

The mantle is about 1,750 miles thick, while the crust is only about 8 miles thick. This thin skin is broken into pieces called tectonic plates. The plates are like puzzle pieces, floating on top of the Earth's inner core. Sometimes the pieces slide under or against each other and become stuck.

When the pieces slide apart, they create tremendous force. This force causes the earth to shake and ripple. Over 80 percent of the earth's earthquakes happen in the Pacific Ocean, in a place known as the "Ring of Fire." Annually, around 10,000 people die in earthquakes every year. Most of the deaths happen when people are trapped in falling buildings. After an earthquake, mudslides, fires and tsunamis can also hurt people.

Fun Facts All About Earthquakes for Kids

Alaska, California and Hawaii have the most earthquakes in the U.S. Other western states, like Nevada, Idaho, Washington and Oregon are prone to earthquakes or can be damaged by earthquakes that happen in Alaska and California.

Alaska has more earthquakes than any other U.S. state. It has experienced over 12,000 earthquakes in the last 30 years. Alaska is followed by California, Hawaii, Nevada, Washington, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana and Utah.

Underneath the Earth's surface lie tectonic plates. These plates move and shift over time. Sometimes they slide under one another or push up against each other, creating enormous stress. When they move again, they cause an earthquake.

Scientists who study earthquakes are called seismologists.

Seismologists can tell how serious an earthquake is by a machine called a seismogram, which rates the intensity of the quake's shaking.

Scientists can use special instruments to record an earthquake's strength. An earthquake rated 3 to 5 is minor; an earthquake rated 5 to 7 is moderate to strong; an earthquake rated 7 to 8 is major; an earthquake rated 8 or above is great.

On average, one earthquake measuring 8 or above happens every year.

The area near Japan in the Pacific Ocean has the most earthquakes in the world. This area also has a lot of volcanoes. It is called the Ring of Fire.

Most people who die in earthquakes die when buildings collapse on them. Others die in floods, fires or mudslides that happen after the earthquake.

May 22nd 1960 in Valdivia Chile the largest ever recorded Earthquake measuring a whopping 9.5 magnitude struck.

December 26th 2004 an Earthquake in the Indian Ocean measuring a magnitude of 9.1 on the Richter Scale resulted in a massive Tsunami hitting the region which resulted in the deaths of over 230,000 people.

March 11th 2011 off the coast of Honshu Japan a magnitude 9.0 earthquake caused a massive Tsunami to hit the coast. The Tsunami caused over 18,000.

On our planet earth we have four different types of dip-slip-faults and they are Normal - Reverse - Thrust - Strike Up.

Earthquake Vocabulary

Learn More All About Earthquakes and Why They Happen

Imagine that you're sitting in school when the ground begins to shake. Books fall off the shelves and you might even be thrown from your chair. That's what happens when an earthquake occurs. Earthquakes are the most deadly of all natural disasters. Over 10,000 people die every year in earthquakes.

Easy Science All About Earthquakes for Kids Video

Watch this interesting video all about earthquakes:

Earthquake Q&A

Question: Do all earthquakes cause damage?

Answer: Most earthquakes cause only minor shaking. Southern California has about 10,000 earthquakes every year. Some of them are so mild people don't even feel them.

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Question: What can I do to be safe in an earthquake?

Answer: If you're in a building in an earthquake, get under a table or desk and hold onto it. If you're outside, move to an open area away from trees, buildings or power lines.

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Question: What should I do to keep safe in an earthquake?

Answer: The best way to survive an earthquake is to take cover under a sturdy table. Get down low and place your hands over your head. You can even duck down in a door frame or curl up next to a couch or bed. Don't go outside, though. Many people die from falling debris.

Enjoyed the Natural Science for Kids website all about Earthquakes info? Take the FREE & fun all about Earthquakes quiz and download FREE all about Earthquakes worksheet for kids. For lengthy info click here.

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All About Earthquakes and Why They Happen Fun Science Facts for Kids. Learn more all about Earthquakes through our Easy Earth Science for Kids website.

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The wind at the beach is whipping at 95 miles an hour. Waves 16 feet tall are crashing down. Even sharks are heading out to calmer waters. A hurricane is on its way.

These powerful storms have different names depending on where in the world they form. They're called hurricanes if they occur in the Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, and eastern Pacific Ocean. In the western Pacific Ocean, they're known as typhoons; in the southern Pacific and Indian Oceans, they're called cyclones.

Scientists know them all as tropical cyclones. As many as 150 occur around the world each year.

How a hurricane forms

Hurricanes are strong storms that start in the ocean and have winds of at least 74 miles an hour. In the Northern Hemisphere (the part of Earth north of the equator), hurricanes generally occur between mid-August to late October. In the Southern Hemisphere (the area south of the equator), storm season is between April and December, with peak storm activity around May and November. During these times, oceans have warmer water, which is what a hurricane needs to form.

Hurricanes begin when a tropical depression forms in the ocean. A tropical depression is a line of rain showers and weak thunderstorms that circle around an area of low air pressure. If the water is at least 79°F, a hurricane might form.

The low air pressure causes the hot, humid air from the ocean to rise in a spiral shape. As that warm air rises, it releases heat, cools down, and condenses into gusty bands of clouds and storms. The low-pressure area continues to suck up hot, moist air, and the spiral gets stronger and faster.

When winds reach 39 miles an hour, the tropical depression becomes a tropical storm. When winds reach 74 miles an hour, it's officially a hurricane.

As a hurricane moves over cooler water or hits land, it loses the warm water that fuels it and begins to weaken. But dangerous winds can still cause damage, and storm surges-when a strong storm pushes ocean water ashore-can flood coastal areas with more than 20 feet of water. Heavy rains and floods can continue far inland.

Understanding a hurricane's strength

Hurricanes are classified by wind speed and the amount of damage that scientists predict the storm will cause when it reaches land. (In the United States, this is done by the National Hurricane Center, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.)

For example, a Category 1 storm has wind speeds of 74 to 95 miles an hour and will probably damage some homes and cause a few power outages. But a Category 5 hurricane is considered a powerful, destructive storm. These storms have winds of 156 miles an hour or more and will likely cause so much damage that people must abandon their communities, which will need months to clean up.

These rankings can help predict the severity of an approaching storm, but any hurricane can be devastating. For instance, Hurricane Katrina was only a Category 3 storm when it hit the U.S. Gulf Coast around Louisiana and Mississippi in 2005. The storm caused over $100 billion in damages, and nearly 2,000 people died.

Predicting the path

Meteorologists can predict the path that a hurricane will travel-and where it will make landfall-by analyzing changes in temperature, cloud formations, and air circulation patterns. That data is gathered by specialized aircraft, satellites, and weather surveillance radar from above the Earth. Other scientific devices that float in the ocean can measure winds, waves, and air and sea temperatures.

The information from these tools is used to create computer forecasting models used by scientists to learn when a storm is forming, where it might travel, and how severe it will be. That can help local officials release warnings or even evacuation orders in order to keep people safe from the coming hurricane.

Naming hurricanes

Once a storm's wind speed reachers 39 miles an hour, it becomes a tropical storm and is given a name. The name is chosen from a list of about 20 names issued by the World Meteorological Organization at the beginning of the hurricane season. They alternate between female and male names.

But you won't see David, Katrina, Andrew, or Laura on that list-those hurricanes were so destructive that the names have been removed. And you won't hear of any hurricanes starting with Q, U, X, Y, or Z, since few names begin with those letters.

More powerful storms in the future?

In the future, scientists don't expect to see more hurricanes, but they do expect more powerful ones. That's because hurricanes get bigger more quickly in warmer water. As climate change causes ocean temperatures to rise, scientists predict that future hurricanes will be rainier and longer lasting.

How to survive a hurricane

The safest thing to do is to follow local instructions and leave the area, or evacuate, if officials say you should. Here are other tips for staying safe if a hurricane is headed your way.

Before a hurricane
* Know the evacuation routes in your neighborhood, and make sure your parents have put gas in the car.
* Check your yard to see if any branches are broken on trees and alert an adult if they are. (Those branches could break off and soar through a window!)
* Bring in anything that could blow away, like garbage cans and outdoor furniture.
* Close all your windows, storm shutters, blinds, and curtains.

During a hurricane
* If you haven't evacuated, stay indoors where it's safe.
* Fill all bathtubs and sinks with clean, cold water in case water lines are damaged or the supply becomes contaminated.
* Ride out the storm in an interior room, such as a hallway or closet on the lowest level of your house.
* Never go near a window, even if it's boarded up.
* If it looks like the storm is going to hit your home, lie on the floor under a table or another sturdy object.
* Limit the use of cell phones to free up space for emergency calls.

After a hurricane
* Listen to weather reports to make sure the storm has passed. A calm sky might be just the hurricane's eye, or center, and more storm fun will be on the way.
* If you evacuated, return only when officials say it's safe.
* Check all food for spoilage. Remember: If in doubt, throw it out.

Adapted from the Nat Geo Kids book Extreme Weather by Thomas Kostigen, revised for digital by Laura Goertzel

Learn more about hurricanes, typhoons, and cyclones at National Geographic.

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